Baltimore County, MD NextUp: Baltimore County, 15 Jun 2016

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From YouTube: Have an invention? Make it.

Description

NextUP Baltimore County interviews Hayley Evans, Lab Manager for Fab Lab Baltimore, a maker space located at the CCBC Catonsville campus. The Fab lab is open to the public and offers classes, 3d printers, industrial routers, and other equipment for making ideas into reality. Have an idea for a prototype? Hayley lets you know just how easy it is to make it happen.

Learn more about the lab at http://www.fablabbaltimore.org/

Want to work in advanced manufacturing? The Design, Fabrication and Advanced Manufacturing program at CCBC can help you take advantage of the growing need for highly skilled technical professionals in the manufacturing industry:

http://www.ccbcmd.edu/Programs-and-Courses/Schools-and-Academic-Departments/School-of-Applied-and-Information-Technology/Applied-Technology/Design-Fabrication-and-Advanced-Manufacturing.aspx

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We are looking at advanced manufacturing in the county.

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and today I'm excited to have hayley evans from our fablab baltimore joining us.

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hayley, welcome! hi! glad to be here.. You know,, I walked into your fablab with you a couple days ago.

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And we saw brandon wagner and I got chills what you guys were doing.

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He was doing a prototype that could actually change lives,.

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Save lives in the third world., and this is sort of a hidden gem. You have over there at fablab.

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Tell people what is it?, what is fablab? so, fablab is a public digital fabrication. Lab.

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So, they have digital fabrication, equipment.

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And once people take a quick and affordable intro course,.

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They have access to all the software and equipment that the lab has.

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Okay,, so what kind of people are coming? Through?

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I've seen you with different folks coming through there. everyone from inventors to entrepreneurs, to artists.

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To people that simply have a lot of free time and they want to explore what digital fabrication is.

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I see quite a few people that have an idea for an invention.

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And they want a prototype that idea., you know, they're, tired of working for someone else, and they want to start their own business., so they're prototyping their product and looking to go into production..

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So I know your lab --. Your fablab is kind of a one-of-a-kind in the area,.

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And it's got a lot of different equipment in there. run us through the kind of tools people are using there..

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So we have a few high-end 3d printers.

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So that's a machine that extrudes plastic.

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So you go from a 3d model to an actual real-life version of that object.

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We have a few laser cutters. so,. These machines can cut and engrave a huge variety of material.

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We also have a cnc router,, so that's essentially a cutter.

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That's attached to a robot that can cut large-scale things like furniture.

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It can also cut complex curvature,, like if you needed, to make a mold,.

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You can use the cnc router to do that..

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We also have a 3d scanner and then a few pcb mills.

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So if you needed to make a circuit board,, you can do that using those machines.

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Okay. I'd love to give people an example of.

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Some of the things that are getting made., I know I saw some ccbc students, public school students,.

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Just people from the community in there; artists.

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What kind of things are people making in fablab?.

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Again,, it's a huge variety of things.

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One interesting application is medical devices,.

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Or things like prosthetics., we had the boy scouts come in and they were doing a project.

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Where they were producing prosthetic hands.

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For people that were missing their hands.

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Oh, they did that with you, guys. right,, and they were doing that using the 3d printer.

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Since 3d printing allows you to easily customize things,.

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Medical applications are really appropriate for 3d printing.

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People are also doing art projects..

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So if you want to make a print or something like that,, you can use the laser cutter or the cnc router to make the plate for your print.

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Okay., so I know you're located in ccbc at the catonsville campus,.

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Kind of in the lower portion of the tech building.

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And it feels like you're right in the middle of this big shift.

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In terms of, like, work and careers,.

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And there's new opportunities coming..

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What are you seeing from the shift in jobs,.

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From the people that are walking into fablab?.

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Well, in general, there's a shift, that's happening.

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From large-scale production to medium- or small-batch, production.

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And digital fabrication allows people to do that.

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So this equipment allows people to not just have to send away.

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The blueprint for something and then have it, be machined using,, like,, really expensive, complex, manufacturing, processes,.

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But they can do it more small batch., so people are doing that. they're coming in and they're prototyping ideas with the intention of actually doing small-scale production.

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So it's quicker,, it's cheaper., exactly.!

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Are these people that are-- generally working for somebody else.

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And now they're trying to break out and do something on their own?

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right! exactly.

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That's another opportunity that the lab affords people, is that they don't have to work for someone else now..

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They now have the ability to start their own business.

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Okay. well,, I'm a curious person..

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I think there's a lot of people that kind of come up with some great ideas and it gets down on paper or they say it and then nothing gets done because "how am I going to make this?".

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Sounds like fablab is a place that you can sort of test drive these things,.

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And maybe there's an easy on-ramp to kind of come in and get it done.

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So let's say I'm a curious person;. I've got an idea.

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And I really don't know how to make it or what to do.

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What is, sort of, step one? to get to fablab and start making these things from scratch?.

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Well, step one would be to take the intro course at fablab, baltimore.

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So you can go to our website and then-- at fablabbaltimore.org.

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And you can sign up for the intro course. and that's going to give you access to all the equipment and machinery.

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And another thing I tell people is don't get bogged down by how much you think you don't know.

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you'd, be extremely surprised by how accessible and easy to use.

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All the 2d and 3d design software is,, but also how accessible all the equipment is.

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Okay,, so that's a short course,, not too expensive, to sort of get the lay of the land.

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It's a one-time, course., it's under $100 and it's two hours.

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Okay., so when they're done with that,, they can start hitting the machines.

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Are they taking their designs from paper or digital files?.

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Mm hm.: what are they doing when they go from idea to hitting your machines?.

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So the first thing you need to do is take your idea and bring it into the computer.. So that's where the software comes, in., so you're, using either 2d or 3d design software to create your file.

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And then another really amazing thing about all this equipment.

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Is that the files are able to be translated from machine to machine.

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So if you have something --, you're doing a small-scale version, --.

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You can prototype it on the laser cutter., but then, if you want to make a larger version,, you can bring it to the cnc router.

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Okay. keep going from there to there.

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okay., and I saw it tied into your cad programs at the college.

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I think it's fantastic.: can you give us the url one more time to find it? Online?.

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It's fablabbaltimore.org. okay, great.

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Well,, I want to thank you so much for being here, hayley..

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It's been great to learn about fablab. (, ♪♪♪, ),.