Minifacs

[garrowolf]

Next thing I am working on for my Fusion Age game is the Minifac. Basically a minifac is like a cross between a 3d printer and a vending machine. You get a pattern from the internets. You go to a Minifac and flash the machine with the pattern. It takes several materials and makes the item that you want. The item could be anything relatively simple. If it includes components that it can't make then you can put some extra components into a hopper and it will add them if it is included in the pattern how to do so. You could make nearly anything with these things including clothes, furniture, simple computers, parts for larger items, etc. It would have a wide set of materials to choose from and these materials would be designed to be easy to return to the machine to take apart again.

The idea is that this will change the normal economics and trade so that the only things that are purchased besides some components are larger and very complex items. I was thinking that the materials would come in little cubes so the term 'cubits' developed to represent materials amounts for minifacs.

A person on a ship or a space station with limited space and materials would have a salary, a place to live, medical, and a certain amount of cubits all based on what your rank or position was. So you have a certain number of cubits to cover the goods that you would fill your place with. Maybe you keep some in reserve for parties. You go and fabricate some stuff for the party, chairs, plates, cups, etc. and bring it back for use. Then you clean it up and take it back and get your cubits credited back. This way you don't have to have a huge amount of different things in ship's stores and people don't have to lug as much around most of the time. They just keep patterns of the things they like.

So I am basically trying to figure out how to work out the amount of cubits things would be. Somethings would basically be a bag filled with expanding hardened foam like furniture but other things would be more dense. It could just be weight but I'm not sure how much things would weigh if you could make a couch out of expanding foam. Even that would be light. Plus things get more complex because of different patterns of the same type of item. I was thinking of some things with a base number of cubits and some variations for more cubits or something like that.

Also you would be able to purchase items if you were passing through. You would be able to keep the pattern of things you bought. Basically the value of the cubit would change based on being closer or farther away from shipping lanes or major cities. Most items would be listed by their cubits cost so this way you can have the value of all of the items change from place to place very easily and simply.

Anyway, any ideas to help develop this?

 

[ajanders]

1. Check out the fabbers at MIT.
2. Consider the efficiency of fabrication and the critical materials that may be needed.
3. You aren't getting any consumables. Food, water, matches, fireworks, perfume may become stores of value.

 

[jefgorbach]

Your minifac sounds reasonable extension to existing technology. We already have the technology to create/recycle plastic into countless items including soft cotton-like fabric and since everything you mention are common inorganic items so perhaps the basic Cubit is a simple solid plastic block which the machine melts into custom molds/weaves on the fly according to the provided pattern. Units would also accept more expensive Sand and Copper cubes to produce LEDs and wiring for the production of consumer electronics, mirrors, window panes, etc.

Limiting the input to copper, plastic, and sand explains why the minifac produces virtually anything the consumer can program except explosives, food, and anything requiring high-temp/durable materials. Likewise some patterns are deemed illegal for individual ownership (ie: working plastic guns).

While an algae-protein cubit is technically feasible, consumers rarely purchase this additional capability because although the resulting output can be molded into a variety of VISUALLY appealing shapes, it retains the bland texture and sea-weedy taste giving it a Meal-Ready-To-Eat connotation for most people. Accordingly such cubits are extremely cheap (say 1000:1 normal cubit price).

Larger Colonizing, Manufacturing, and Military grade are designed to accept much larger metallic ore cubits for the construction of durable metallic items, weapons, and vehicles - however such units are priced considerably beyond the expectations of most individuals.

 

[garrowolf]

well Actually I was going to have a separate Food minifac as well with food cubits and some various flavors added so that you could program your food choices. You could also put in special ingredients or even your daily medication into the hopper and it would add it to your meal.

I've also got this concept of something called a lifesuit. Basically it is a cross between a duty uniform, body armor, and an emergency space suit. The materials are very advanced and are designed to block micrometeorites. This produced an interesting effect in the first game I used them in. Because they were common among spacers and especially pirates the players had to think differently. They could create Information Age guns easily enough with Minifacs but the armor that was common made them useless. Instead they focused on grapplers and goo guns. They used ship repair tools to grapple with them and hold them. Once they were grappled then someone could unlock their lifesuits and kill them. They really loved it because the simple shoot and kill combat was outside of their ability and combat because very different. They had to reason and trick their way through.

I was definitely going to have metal cubits of various kinds. I figure the minifac could melt and shape it easily. You could have it whip up a shotgun if you have some explosives to go in the bullets.

I guess then instead of having a default concept of cubits as an allowance I will have to be more vague about that part and just list the kinds of things that you can make. Basically a good deal of the equipment list would effectively be free but all of the Fusion Age tech would cost because it would be too advanced for the minifac.

 

[SKyOdin]

The idea of a minifac sounds reasonable, but I think there are a number of things that it would be safe to say couldn't be fabricated by such a machine. While a machine like that would be useful for crafting simple objects of various shapes and functions, I can't see such a machine being able to manufacture stuff like complex electronics. Advanced devices of the Fusion Age may have machines that are engineered down to the molecular level, such as electronic devices made from vibrating atoms arranged in particular ways. Likewise, I don't see a machine designed to be used in a ships living quarters or in an apartment building able to fabricate anything that requires large quantities of energy, high temperatures, or extremely low temperatures to fabricate. Complex chemical reactions are also improbable. Likewise, such a device certainly can't be used to create anything with a living, biological component.

I suggest that keep in mind what kind of technology you envision being used in everyday items in your setting. Are people carrying around cell-phones made with silicon computer chips, or are they carrying miniature quantum computers? How much bio-technology is used?

I would limit the minifac to objects made out of molded plastic, artificial fiber, and maybe ceramics and metals. I would also limit to the macro scale, and be unable to affect anything on the molecular level. It still allows for a wide range of common everyday objects, but doesn't require the machine to surpass the boundaries of being a reasonable piece of technology for the Fusion age. If you go too far, it starts resembling a Star Trek replicator too much.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Bova didn't use minfacs (at least, not visibly), but he used- and outlawed- nanotech in his stories.

In his Grand Tour, humanity has created nanobots, and they're capable of many things. However, fundamentalist fervor coupled with fear of "Grey Goo" has resulted in it being outlawed on Earth. It is still permitted on Luna and certain outposts like Titan, and as of the book Mars Life, is being considered for use on Mars.

 

[garrowolf]

Modern rapid prototyping machines can create a single item at a time. I was thinking that this would have a series of small rapid prototyping machines with a few robot arms in the middle. They would take the pieces out, cut them to fit, and bond them to each other. I figure that they would put together a Modern Age or even some Cyber Age electronics. They couldn't put together a Fusion Age computer but I was thinking that some people would still use some older computers for easier tasks simply because they were cheap and easy to get. Belters and Refugees on Mars would have a strange mixture of tech based on what is easy to get and use.

I've got some nanite tech used mostly by larger companies. The way I keep them in line is that they only function in a field created by the machine. They get their power and instructions from it.

One of the things that I was going to do was to have nanite a threat for the cyber age when it was first made use of. People did stupid things with them but with the fusion age they stopped being a useful large scale weapon because of EMP defense systems. Now they are just used in some medical and tiny manufacturing. I was keeping the gray goo a threat for the Cyber Age.

I will probably have the nanite pools a tech for the Gravitic Age or something like that.