/sci/ - Science & Math

30 years is a long time, it's going to be pretty hard to speculate what we'll have in 30 years, so I'm changing this to 10 years.

Currently, one cutting edge process that's been demonstrated in the lab today is high speed printing. 3d printing usually takes a long time usually hours, this new process takes it down to minutes at the expense of accuracy. But with ten years of development we should be able to keep the accuracy fairly high.

Printing big stuff is another trend. Especially for anything made of titanium, as one wastes less titanium this way than machining it. Pic related is a large titanium component for a Chinese stealth fighter.

We have the technology today to print something the size of a 747 if we wanted to the same way today, the only reason why we aren't is speed of printing, fatigue concerns, and carbon fiber is probably better.

Printing precision investment casting ceramic molds is a technology that is less than 5 years away from commercialization and is going to disrupt quite a bit of industry.