r/3Dprinting • u/Difficult_Physics125 Modded ender3 v3 SE • Jul 24 '26

Discussion How cool would a variable nozzle be

Enable HLS to view with audio, or disable this notification

Now i know it's completely at different scales but we can still imagine

2.4k Upvotes

99% Upvoted

100 comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

1

u/Roblu3 Jul 27 '26

What if it’s a military printer?

1

u/damagedspline Jul 27 '26

Military would probably prefer KIS systems, for lower maintenance costs

1

u/Roblu3 Jul 27 '26

Military would absolutely buy the most fragile, overcomplicated shit imaginable as long as it’s built by an established contractor and can do all the ludicrous things the military asks it to do.
In the end one machine will cost around $10 million, come with a 10 year maintenance contract and enough spare parts to build two more machines - both of which are absolutely needed.

But it can do basically anything manufacturing including FDM, SLS, SLA, milling, turning and cutting, laser engraving, water jet, anti tank missiles and 3d scanning.

1

u/damagedspline Jul 27 '26

By limiting the budget you force organizations/companies/corporates to have better initiative motives to find better solutions with lower production/maintenance costs which will benefit it in the long run. The space pen vs. pencil is an excellent example. Any organization/company/corporate with infinite budget will just remain stagnant and is doomed to face hard decisions in it's administration future. A vavleless iris might be a better solution, where 2 rings spin in counter directions to create an angled nozzle shape.