A hundred years ago, Henry Ford was planning the first moving assembly line, to be used for car manufacturing. Introduced at his Highland Park facility in Michigan in 1913, it was one of dozens of innovations for which Ford was responsible, based on four principles he identified 10 years earlier.
Interchangeable parts, continuous flow, division of labour and minimising waste were his watchwords. Though other manufacturers have refined and improved the process of manufacturing beyond measure in the years since, their work was based largely on Ford's essential template.
However, the first tentative steps are now being taken into a new model for production. This could turn Ford's centralised model upside down and reverse 100 years of specialisation, as the digital revolution takes the leap from just moving electrons, to moving entire atoms around.
About 10 years ago, 3D printers started to take off. They were initially used to make items in a variety of materials where production volumes are low or prototypes expensive to produce. As this use progressed, however, items started to emerge that couldn't be produced any other way.
Red Bull Racing uses the devices to print lightweight alloy bearings with a honeycomb core that couldn't be made using any other method. Organovo, a company specialising in regenerative medicine, is marketing a machine that prints skin, muscle and short lengths of blood vessel. Currently being used in trials, within a few years it expects to be producing organs and more complex interconnecting arrangements of blood vessels for transplant therapy.
In the Sahara desert, Markus Kayser has created a solar-powered printer that concentrates the Sun's rays to melt sand, allowing bowls and other objects to be printed in glass. He is one of a number of artists starting to experiment with 3D printing.
For about £100,000, you could own a printer roughly the size of a washing machine, capable of printing plastics in degrees of hardness on an item. It can also engineer tolerances that allow interlocking pieces to be printed in one block and a stool that folds up on itself, yet is printed in a single operation.
Now, three developments are set to affect the way Henry Ford understood the world. First, as the Urbee, a car the body of which was produced on a 3D printer, has gone on display in Canada, one truck manufacturer I spoke to expects to be printing entire truck parts in locally based operations, allowing spares and original parts to be made in a decentralised operation.
Second, print shops are starting to install 3D printers, taking on walk-in business for fabricating anything from camera parts to architects' models. At the same time, online businesses such as Shapeways are offering a mail-order service, thus creating a market for their customers' design files.
Finally, domestic 3D printers are starting to retail at less than £1000. What draws these technologies together is the digital files that drive them; no longer will someone seeking a part for an obsolete washing machine need to find that rare stockist; downloading the file and sending it to print will be all that's needed. As such files proliferate, libraries are sprouting up online to organise, share and monetise them, with Thingiverse and Google 3D warehouse leading the way.
The digitalisation of music, film and books changed those industries; as 3D printing improves, what happened to electron businesses such as EMI will start to affect atom businesses too.
Ford made his first quadricycle in the workshop behind his house, using the tools he had to hand. If he'd been doing it today, he would have used a 3D printer.
- Andrew Walmsley is a digital pluralist
30 SECONDS ON ... THE URBEE
- The Urbee is an eco-friendly hybrid car that has been in development for several years. The first and only completed Urbee went on display in Canada in September. It was partly made using 3D printing technology.
- The Urbee, which uses electric motors and a small ethanol-powered engine, is capable of doing 200 miles to the gallon.
- At present, only the car's body panels are printed, but it is hoped that other parts can be produced in this fashion, further boosting the Urbee's green credentials.
- The car's single-cylinder engine generates 8 horsepower, but the Urbee can reach speeds of 60mph to 70mph. The car also uses solar panels, which could reduce its fuel consumption to zero.
- Project leader Jim Kor says he hopes the Urbee can be put into mass commercial production in 2014. It is estimated that it would cost consumers anywhere between £6500 and £33,000 to buy.