3D PRINTING: The EX¹ – rapid 3D printing of circuit boards
The EX¹ – rapid 3D printing of circuit boards
“In a carefully timed and precisely calculated move, the Australian Cartesian Co. has launched its Kickstarter campaign today, at 2pm GMT, introducing The EX¹ 3D printer. And this is most certainly NOT just another 3D printer. The EX¹ has been developed to print electronics and circuit boards as quickly and as easily as printing a photo, according to the company.
So when I say ‘carefully timed’, this is due to the fact that the Cartesian Co. has coordinated the launch of its campaign to coincide with the 2-year anniversary of an article in Wired that said that ‘within two years 3D printers would print electronic circuits.’
The EX¹ is a desktop device, utilising inkjet technology to print in elemental silver on a range of different substrates in the same way an inkjet printer does. It claims to make the printing of complex circuits simple and quick for a range of applications — from a gamepad remote control for example, to wearable technology.
There is a real barrier into the world of complex circuitry, and Cartesian Co. wants to make electronics accessible for the every day person – giving them the power to bring their ideas to life through creativity and experimentation. We’ve been thinking about how to design a printer that creates circuit boards for four years now and developed the EX¹ over the last 9 months, and we hope the Kickstarter community will feel as passionate about the project as we do. ~ Ariel Briner (Co Founder and Head of Electrical Design at Cartesian)
Currently:
140 Backers
$69,163 pledged of $30,000 goal
28 days to go
Prices starting from $899 for Early Bird KIT (all gone) Now you can get it for $1,499 or more 🙂
This device is able to make a little earthquake on rapid prototyping and 3d printing markets. On one hand you have to know a little bit about preparing circuit boards and electronics to create useful stuff. On the other one number of applications for this technology seems to be endless and because of that army of amateurs will start tinkering and learning new skills just to create their dreamed projects. As you can see on above pictures this technology can’t create whole electronic devices (for example functioning cellphone) but… now it will be much easier and faster to test the idea of our prototype. I am very excited about development of this project! Great job Cartesian Team!