Today was by far the most interesting day of the trip so far to say the least. I had been wanting to go to the Van Gogh Museum and finally got the chance to go this morning. After I got back, I changed and we went to the red light district to visit the worlds first 3D printed bridge. The bridge was built by the company MX3D, a company that specializes in 3D printing with metal. The bridge has sensors built into it, which allow the company to know how many people are on the bridge at a time. After we visited the bridge, we went to the company and received a lecture about the company and the work that they do. Whilst not being the designers, this company has the machinery that can make metal products often times faster and cheaper than traditional molding.
Below I added a picture of some of the things they had on display. It was very interesting to see some of these things, such as the bike, and it made me wonder how many other applications this could apply to. Could you 3D print a boat? what about a car? Whilst I was hoping to get to see the 3D printing in action, I still found the lecture to be very interesting, especially the talk about data analytics, as that is one of my intended majors. While they 3D print something, they are constantly collecting data to analyze if any adjustments need to be made during the printing process. I also found it very interesting that they made all of their code within the company themselves, from code that allows them to visualize the 3D model as it is being made, to post-printing analytics. I thought it was interesting the MX3D does do business with America, although that was all the information we could get due to a pesky NDA.
After the visit, we walked to a huge park near where we were. We were all starving so we split up into groups and all got food. I got these absolutely delicious chicken nuggets and a chocolate cookie ice cream cone for lunch. It was a good thing we got a good lunch in, because dinner wasn’t quite my taste. But, nonetheless today was a great day and im looking forward to (hopefully) sunny weather tomorrow.