Robotic 3D Printer

Update - 04/08/2K14

Hi everyone, I have just logged back in to my instructables account after loosing the login info. Its been a long time. I am amazing by the popularity of this project and what has become of such a simple concept. A number of people have been looking for code, and I have had quite a few companies wanting to go into business with me.

I can confirm that I WILL be bringing out a Newer version (open source) that will be a little more expensive that £50 but far more accurate and reliable. It will involve metal parts. I am hoping that the design will be out 2015 and hopefully I will be able to sell these as kits. Once again thank you for your time and sorry i haven't been very resourceful these past years

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This is a very simple yet effective way of printing 3D materials for under £50. Using a USB Robotic Arm Kit, a Chocolate fountain and a load of programming I have put together this amazing 3D printer!

To complete this you will need:
A USB Robotic Arm
Servo motor and tracks or wheels
A Pump (Or chocolate fountain)
A Heat Source
A Metal Piping funnel
Tubing
Advanced Visual Basic and Robotic Programming Knowledge
Tubing 
Good soldering skills

1.The Arm
To Build the Arm It is simply a case of following the instructions provided.

2.The Pump
Since I did not have a pump I decided to make My own from scratch using an old chocolate fountain. Since this also provided a heat source this was perfect. I put together the chocolate fountain and placed a funnel on top so the funnel will fill with malten plastic and flow into the tubing.

3.The Robotic Base
For this I picked up a cheap Servo Motor and combined it with some lego parts. The servo was then wired into the grabber port (M1) as you do not need that. I took the servo out of the grabber and used it there instead. A lot of soldering took place!

4.The tubing
Simply wire the tube from the funnel of the chocolate fountain into the little metal piping end on the robotic arm. Stick it all down with a glue gun.

5.Programming
I didn't go as far as to make this bluetooth however USB seems to be working just fine. Using Visual Basic I created a calculator to work out the degrees the motor needed to turn. I did this by analysing the pixel RGB colour of an image I prepared earlier using 2D  
Design V2. Each colour represented a different hight. Then using the software that comes with the robotic arm all you have to do is program in the instructions that my VB program gives you.

6.Operating
Turn everything on and press go!