Another "Forge"

Pretty cool… idk how i’d feel about molding chocolate or candy in something that just had liquid metal or plastics in it though

Guess again:
Allforge Sweet

EarlyBird 50% off (10 available): $2495
46% off (20 available): $2695
40% off (30 available): $2995
34% off (40 available): $3295
Retail Price: $5000

Allforge Startup

EarlyBird 50% off (10 available): $3249
45% off (20 available): $3595
38% off (30 available): $3995
32% off (40 available): $4395
Retail Price: $6500

Allforge Boss

EarlyBird 50% off (10 available): $3995
45% off (20 available): $4395
40% off (30 available): $4795
35% off (40 available): $5195
Retail Price: $8000

Mold prices range from $20-$240 depending on the part and how you choose to make it.

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Thanks @pigheaded. That’s interesting. To me it seems that their product falls between the stools as it were. It does not make sense as a general maker tool or a prototyping tool and is too expensive to be a nice to have or toy. I am sure there are use cases but unless you want to make lots of metal parts of very low strength, or a sweets (which in some cases would make sense) the general maker would not bite. Small production runs of lower quality plastic parts could also work I guess.

It’s inevitable that more and more powerful production tools, as opposed to prototyping tools, find their way to the desks of small businesses and makers. For us the Glowforge falls neatly between these two genres - prototyping and production. The Allforge seems to fall into the latter category.

It would be very interesting to see if their campaign is successful but I would hazard a guess that they would not put their funding goal too high.

Anyone else been to their forums…?
Anyone else realize just how similar it is to the Glowforge forums…?
If I didn’t know any better, I’d think they were two machines made by the same company!

They use discourse. It’s the same software that Glowforge uses on this forum. The same goes for Inventables.

Ive been there. I asked what would make me use that machine over just making a mold and filling it myself. They didnt have any really compelling reasons for me to even think about using it other than it fills the mold for you. The whole metals thing is a misleading ploy to get people to consider it. I really dont see a market for something like this.

Has anyone seen any indication of what sort of costs they’re expecting for the molding material refills it will require? I’m just curious as to how much they’re going to gouge for the “ink”, as it were.

For how few times I’d like to make molds, myself – at least initially – I imagine I could laser cut or 3d print a positive and make the mold with off-the-shelf silicon supplies. The good thing is that so many other technologies can fill the production gaps.

That makes a whole lotta sense! However, even their categories are almost identical to here.

And @takitus, good point. It seems like it could make things slightly easier, but not for those prices for me. Way too much for something I could do myself. I’ll pay higher for something that can enable me to do something I couldn’t do before. And having to get a third party to make the molds for me, seems like too much work and money.

Now if it could make a mold as well as fill it, and make the mold “reusable” per say, like how you can remold plastics…that would be enticing to me.

I haven’t looked into it too much. But since the video shows an open-to-air hopper with pellets in it, they haven’t locked you to using anything proprietary. Just find something which melts in the appropriate range, and then make small chunks.

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Their FAQ at the top of the page of their forum actually says you can use your own materials and sounds like they consider theirs to be something similar to Proofgrade.

“Can I use my own materials or do I need to buy them from Allforge? Yes, you can use your own materials - always! We will be offering our own materials which are verified and come with preset settings to eliminate the guess work on your side, but you can even use recycled materials if you’d like - it’s up to you!”

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Looking through the forum - it looks like it does indded use a “hopper” of sortswhich melts the available pellets. They claim you can use your own ( een mention your own shredded PET plastic from bottles). That part is very interesting - that you could mold something from your own recycleables (and re mold if you didn’t like results). However, that price point - ouch - even with the founders discount.

Video format looked similar too. Same production company?

Looks to me that they want some quick cash and based it off of the glowforge format.

I love how the guy is half in the dark lol. Kinda shady…

They hearted an Instagram post of mine that’s tagged with #glowforge the other day. I was like, “ok, that’s cute, whatever, I checked them out months ago and it’s not for me but if people find them via the like list I’m ok with that.”

Then they commented on the post a day later with a spammy “Well check US out!” kind of thing.

Uh, no… Comment deleted, account blocked. That’s creepy and reeks of desperation to me, auto-comment or not. I’m an advocate of GF for many reasons (@dan_berry’s post up above was a great summary) but also because I’ve never seen anything except integrity in their marketing.

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Same thing happened to me recently…