Blog Post 6: 3D Printing for the Public

Samples of 3d prints done in 2025

The year 2025 has been a good start to my 3d printing business. Alongside selling Brownsville souvenirs, I have been printing for clients from small to large, one to many prints. There is a demand in Brownsville and all across the US for people and companies needing 3d prints. The only other 3d printing service I could find is the Brownsville Public Library MakerSpace. But they have a bureaucracy form to fill out prior to printing along with a ton of rules. Take a look at their 3D Printing Rules as seen below.

3D Printing Rules for the Brownsville Public Library. See more at Form Center.

A former student/employee of mine also started his unofficial 3d printing business and mostly selling prints to college students, where he is also a student in Mechanical Engineering. It's interesting that he was also my student in high school taking the engineering class I used to teach. In one of those courses there were lessons on 3d design, specifically Autodesk Inventor, and basic 3d printing. Who knew that we would eventually begin our own 3d printing business 😂. I help him with questions and advice to help him get his business up and running.

Other than us, I don't see any other companies doing 3d printing, Basically, what I do is kinda like Kinkos for 3d printing. Anyone remember Kinkos 😆? The idea is to get a location and set up 3d printers and computers. Those that are savvy enough can use the computers to open the slicer software and modify the model before printing. Otherwise I would help clients with the slicer and/or designs.

As mentioned earlier, there is a demand and that's just in Brownsville. Let's look at why 3d printers are not ubiquitous yet.

1. Cost - Buying a good 3d printer can be cost prohibitive for some especially multi-color printers.

2. Learning curve - Understanding how to use a 3d printing without prior knowledge can be overwhelming

3. Additional software - Also, the need to download and learn to use a slicer software to be able to print.

4. Slicer tools - slicer software are also used to add supports to models that have hanging sections, add additional supports, scale up/down, etc. Lots of learning curbs.

5. Maintenance - 3d printers require occasional maintenance and sometimes can breakdown adding frustration if error codes can't be understood to fix the issues.

Why a demand on 3d printing?

1. Model(s) not available in store or online. Printing becomes the only option.

2. Designers and architects want to print their models for physical visuals.

3. Replace broken parts that are not available to purchase.

4. Create a 3d model (I use Meshy to convert 2d to 3d models) from an image and then print.

5. Lots of materials and colors to choose from. Most 3d printers can print various types of polymer-based materials such as PLA, PETG, ABS, ASA, etc.