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back to article ‘Printed boat’ places second in novelty race

A student club from the University of Washington has not only used 3D printing to build a boat – it’s taken the boat to second place in the university’s annual Milk Carton Derby at Seattle’s Green Lake. Even better than that: the 3D printer had to be set up to use HDPE – milk carton plastic – to print the boat, a material …

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  1. Eddy Ito

    Simply a titanic endeavour!

    Seriously, the end of the race, Titanic. It's ok, I didn't see the iceberg either and I assume there were enough life jackets to go around. Oh, race video is here.

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  2. jake Silver badge

    THIS is "hacking", ElReg.

    Not cracking, not phishing/carding (or other social engineering), not skiddies faffing about with other people's code ... This is good, old fashioned hacking.

    Could you please use the term properly? It ain't all that hard ...

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    1. Asiren
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      Facepalm

      Re: THIS is "hacking", ElReg.

      So you're saying that the one time it's used right, it's "used" incorrectly...

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      1. jake Silver badge
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        Re: THIS is "hacking", ElReg.

        No, I'm imploring ElReg to use it properly at all times.

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  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    How many students did they kill in the process?

    HDPE can produce toxic fumes when heated, hence why most of the Maker 3D Printer community use ABS or PLA.

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    1. tirk
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      Coat

      Re: How many students did they kill in the process?

      No students, but many Bothans....

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    2. The BigYin
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      Re: How many students did they kill in the process?

      You'll notice in the slideshow that one of the students is wearing a mask. My guess is that all those who may be exposed would be similarly kitted up. We are talking about intelligent engineering students at a reputable university here; not the plant in Africa or China where you e-waste goes to be recycled by children.

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  4. The BigYin

    A very interesting idea

    Laser sintering would also allow much more innovative structures that would simply be too hard to manually build.

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    1. Michael Dunn
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      Re: A very interesting idea

      Stem cells, 3-d printing and laser sintering - new hearts for old!

      I wish I'd been in time!

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  5. Peter Ford

    Nothing new here

    Many years ago we used to use bits of Yoplait (yoghurt drink) bottles to do field repairs on the plastic kayaks we spit on Alpine rivers. The kit was a bit less sophisticated - usually a gas stove to heat up a knife blade and melt the plastic into the hole...

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    1. Michael Dunn
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      Re: Nothing new here

      It was canvas in Hornblower's day.

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  6. Pinchy

    The photo

    Did anyone else think the photo looks like a model rather than a real room? Like a showbox diarama?

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  7. Bruno Girin

    @Peter Ford

    The novelty is not in using melted milk carton plastic to build or repair things, the novely is in doing this with a 3D printer (presumably controlled by a computer from a 3D model). So to use your analogy what they've done here is take a 3D model of your kayak and create a real kayak from scratch using milk cartons and a printer.

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