Print your own flute

"Cheap 3D printers can now quickly make plastic replicas of almost anything, from an insect's wings to copies of their own parts. But now Amit Zoran and his team from the MIT Media Lab have used one to recreate the intricate design of a flute (see video above).

They started by making a digital model of the instrument based on a metal flute but with adaptations to account for the new materials used, and the level of precision possible, with 3D printing. The model was then sent to a 3D printer which constructed the flute in four parts over a period of 15 hours. It squirts out three different plastic composites developed by Objet, the company that created the printer they used. Once the printing was complete, the researchers just had to put together the four parts and manually add springs.

When tested by a flautist, the plastic flute was given the thumbs up for sound. "It sounds perfect in terms of the acoustics," says Seth Hunter. But there are issues with the design of the mouthpiece and the keys which the team plans to improve. With the 3D printing technique, they can modify their model and create a new prototype relatively quickly and cheaply. The flute in the video is the seventh iteration of their design.

The goal, however, isn't to create a flute that's superior to a metal one: the challenge is to print a working flute that's acoustically and ergonomically similar. "This project is a technical exercise, an effort to see how far we can push designs for 3D printing technologies," says Zoran. In the future, the technology could be used to create novel instruments, like a trumpet with multiple pipes, that would be hard to make otherwise."

Read more at New Scientist (Thanks Annette M)