3D printer wows world’s top high-tech fair
‘Couch potato’ rowing chair energises CEBIT
HANOVER, Germany, March 5, (AFP): Of all the futuristic gadgets on show at CeBIT, the world’s top high-tech fair, few drew bigger crowds Tuesday than a 3D printer creating solid objects in plastic from a computer display.
The machine, developed by German company “fabbster”, melts plastic and then builds up incredibly fine “layers” just 88 microns (0.088 millimetres) thick, eventually producing a solid physical object with impressive detail.
The system is currently being used mainly by small businesses, architects, designers and engineers, explained Fabian Grupp, project manager.
In theory, there is no limit to the size of the object produced, but the machine displayed at CeBIT has a maximum capacity of 22.5cm by 22.5cm by 21cm (8.8 inches by 8.8 inches by 8.3 inches), he explained.
“You can really make anything you can think of,” he enthused. Coming soon is the ability to create multi-coloured objects and use different materials within the same “print-out”.
The time varies from object to object, but the machine takes around one hour to “print out” a small plastic bottle.
It looks like an ordinary black, comfy chair, perfect for a relaxing hour or two in front of the television.
But things are rarely as they seem at the CeBIT, the world’s top high-tech fair, and this humblelooking chair is part-nurse, part-fitness coach designed for the increasing hoards of elderly in Germany and across the developed world.
Highly intelligent sensors in the chair register the owner’s weight, blood pressure, heart rate and posture and builds a database of vital signs over a period of time.
And if the chair notices a few extra pounds, it flips into fitness coach mode and suggests a series of exercises.
The comfy arm-rests convert into a fully functioning rowing machine and the user “rows” down a river displayed on a big screen.
“Even in this mode, the sensors record all the vital signs and the health assistant notes if the person is not performing the exercises properly,” said Sven Feilner from the Fraunhofer Institute as he put himself through his paces.
Users can link up with other users and “race” against each other or simply follow a tailor-made fitness programme, monitored closely by the chair.
The chair exercises the mind as well, with a “Simon Says”-type memory game in which the user shifts his or her weight in the chair in response to a random pattern.
Precious mediaeval books, usually displayed in glass cases and touchable only with gloves, can now be read in glorious 3D, thanks to a system unveiled Tuesday at the world’s top tech fair.
With the 3D interactive book explorer, developed by Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute, users browse through the sinewy Latin text and colourful illustrations penned centuries ago but in a distinctly up-todate manner.
The text is scanned in and displayed on a flat-screen display and readers, standing a couple of metres (feet) back from the screen, scroll through the pages just by waving their hands in the air to operate motion sensor cameras.
The Fraunhofer Institute is working with the Bavarian State Library in the southern city of Munich to make some of their ancient collections available to a wider audience, explained project leader Paul Chojecki.
“I think the oldest book digitalised so far is at least 1,000 years old,” he said.