Home Depot starts selling MakerBot 3D printers 3D printed nuts and bolts from a MakerBot. Home Depot, the world s largest home improvement chain, announced the start of a pilot program�to sell MakerBots. They are described by the manufacturer as a type of professional-grade 3-D printing machine and will be in a dozen stores following a three-month period of online-only sales. (Video) � The MakerBot printers, which range from a compact $1,375 model to a high-end $2,899 version, went on sale July 14 in Chicago and New York City-area stores, as well as Home Depot locations throughout California.As we were thinking about a partnership with MakerBot, we re always looking for new innovation, Joe Downey, Home Depot s online merchant for tools, told HuffPost by phone.It s really about bringing about new innovation to customers. 3-D printers can whip up everything from�vagina selfies�to�handguns, but Home Depot envisions its customers using the MakerBots for decidedly more practical applications.Imagine a world where you can 3-D print replacement parts and use 3-D printing as an integral part of design and building work, MakerBot CEO Bre Pettis said in a statement. In demonstration kiosks at the 12 pilot locations, Home Depot employees can show customers how to print items like�replacement parts and product prototypes, CBS reports. While a MakerBot can, in theory, churn out many of the same items that people go to Home Depot to buy, the retailer doesn t seem worried about 3-D printing itself into obsolescence.We re comfortable with the partnership, Downey said, noting that customers haveeconomies of scale to consider. In other words, a MakerBot owner would be unlikely to print all her own screws or bolts for a large project. Besides, said Pettis of the current fleet of MakerBot printers,You can t use it as a hammer. Downey said customers typically use the printers for personalization projects, like a Chicago father who Downey said purchased a MakerBot to print custom furniture for his daughter s dollhouse. The current generation of 3-D printers are still relatively slow �printing an item the size of a Lego brick can take roughly half an hour� and customers would still need to go to a store to purchase the (often costly) raw materials.Ten years from now, it will be quite common for people to have 3-D printers in their homes, Tim Shepherd, an analyst with the U.K.-based research firm Canalys,�told Bloomberg last week. In addition to Home Depot, companies like�Amazon, Staples and Dell have joined the ranks of 3-D printer retailers. Touted as asecond industrial revolution, 3-D printing comprises a $3 billion industry�that has grown 600 percent�in the past decade, Forbes reports. Via Huffington Post Share ThisSubscribedel.icio.usFacebookRedditStumbleUponTechnorati