If you remember our post on how tools are organized on the International Space Station, it's hard to imagine they'd forget to bring anything. But according to Mike Chen, whose Made in Space startup built the 3D printer currently sitting on the ISS, station commander Barry "Butch" Wilmore found himself in need of a tool. Writes Chen:
My colleagues and I just 3D-printed a ratcheting socket wrench on the International Space Station by typing some commands on our computer in California. We had overheard ISS Commander Barry Wilmore (who goes by "Butch") mention over the radio that he needed one, so we designed one in CAD and sent it up to him faster than a rocket ever could have. This is the first time we've ever "emailed" hardware to space.
The 3D printer and designs for 20 test objects were sent up to the ISS in September, for the purpose of printing the objects in space, to later be compared to objects printed on Earth to see if there are any performance differences.
But Wilmore's wrench was apparently an add-on, whipped up by the team on the ground in Autodesk Inventor before being e-mailed upstairs.
The ISS's printer isn't just sitting out on a counter, by the way; As you can see in the photos below, they've got it tucked away in the Microgravity Science Glovebox, a sealed and airlock-equipped container for holding potentially hazardous materials. (This includes mere liquids; should these things float about the cabin they could cause some serious damage.)
Here, an astronaut pulls the wrench out of the machine.
"What I'm really excited about," says Chen, "is the impact this could have on human space exploration beyond Earth orbit. When we do set up the first human colonies on the moon, Mars and beyond, we won't use rockets to bring along everything we need. We'll build what we need there, when we need it."
If the Millennium Falcon had access to this kind of technology, it might still have a round radar dish on it.
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