Man In New Zealand 3D Prints The World’s Smallest Working Drill

3D printing is amazing as you can print all sorts of things with, like working prototypes, devices used in the medical industry, even guns, and so on, and recently a man from New Zealand used 3D printing technology to print a working drill. Now the fact that the drill actually works is impressive enough to have come from a 3D printer, but the fact that it measures 7.5mm wide makes it even more impressive.

Speaking to the folks at 3DPrint.com, Lance Abernethy, the man in question said, “I have always liked small things and have created small items since I was a little kid. I was with my work colleagues and was talking about mythical stories about one country making a twist drill and sending it to another. The other country returned it with a hole through the middle. Things like this easily challenge me and my idea was born.”

To start, Abernethy drew the outer shell of the drill based on an actual, normal-sized drill as a reference. He then 3D printed it using his Ultimaker 2 with a 0.25mm nozzle to help with the precision of it. Patience was also an important factor as he took his time printing it out at 10mm per second. All in all it took him 25 minutes to print the entire thing, which is pretty long when you consider how small it is.

A hearing aid’s battery was used for power and a headphone cable was used for wiring. Soldering all the parts together took him an additional 3 hours as the wires kept breaking, but the end result is a pretty cute and impressive piece of work. To see the drill in action, check it out in the video above.

Tyler Lee
Categories: Gadgets
Tags: 3D Printing