NASA Ready to Ship 3D Printer to Space Station

September 3, 2014 – Back in July 2012 I wrote about Made in Space, a company focused on developing 3D printers that could be used to build components, satellites and habitations in the environment of space.

Two years later the 3D printer, named the 3D Printing in Zero-G Technology Demonstration project, is ready to go and should be delivered to the International Space Station (ISS) by SpaceX in the next two weeks. When it gets there what will the crew use it to do?

Initially the printer will generate 21 demonstration parts and tools which will be brought back to Earth for analysis to ensure that 3D printing works as advertised in microgravity. If this phase works then the crew will then move on to making more meaningful tools and hardware for use on the ISS and in cubesat deployments.

Unfamiliar with cubesats? These are small satellites that commercial operators are turning to with increasing frequency as a way to get unprecedented access to space.

Made in Space hopes, once the 3D printer demonstration has proved itself the company can get on with its plans to put a permanent additive manufacturing facility onboard ISS. What it will mean for the space station is an ability to do parts maintenance for many components without relying on resupply from Earth.

When we first reported this story the microgravity printing was being tested on the Vomet Comet, the aircraft that astronauts use to experience microgravity through parabolic flight paths while still in the atmosphere. Now instead of a few seconds in which to test additive manufacturing, the printer will have as much time as it needs to prove its technological advantages.

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• How NASA Will Use 3D Printers in Space (Video)