Imagine a spirograph crossed with a candy floss machine crossed with a printer. Or put it another way - remember the replicator from Star Trek which would beam up a fabulously tasty concoction out of this air?

Wouldn’t it be cool if that were real?

Well, the fabulously named Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories have done just that with their latest production CandyFab (aka The Evil Mad Scientist 3D Fabricator)

3D printers aren’t totally new. But they are extremely pricey. The Z Corp Z450 will set you back a cool $40,000. But Candyfab was first built using three sacks of granulated sugar, an aquarium pump, a car jack and some recycled printer parts. And it only bloody works.

It’s totally open source - so you can make one at home. In fact, since people have been making their own at home, printing has been refined from 5 ppi to 20 ppi. Not bad for something home-grown and made using odds and ends on the cheap.

Yet another example of innovation at its best when driven by the minds of many rather than the minds of the few. (And apparently my interest in geeky things to do with printers!)

See the whole process in its full glory at Flickr

[ as always, courtesy of Wired ]