03 Sep Some of us

Hi makers,

today we (tenere a battesimo) a new space, a blog wich will allow us to update you step by step about our work, and where we are going to talk togheter about different interesrting argouments.

This blog is born with the desire to share ideas, point of views, and our passion with all of you; we want to extend the open phylosophy also into the comunication of our project, hoping you can appreciate if not all content at least the commitment that we will.

In order to begin, i think is good to start from introductions: we are the Collettivo Cocomeri, a little team composed by four designers born into the Ecodesign cours of the Politecnico of Turin.

When we were starting to write our degree thesis, about two years ago (ahime) we approached makers and DIY world, discovering an ecosystem extremely interesting and various, full of knowledge and ideas, but still little known and appreciated outside of a small circle of insiders.

We met the guys of the Fablab Turin and extraordinary projects that they carry forward with few resources and lots of talent. With their collaboration we started our thesis project, Felfil, that without them would have remained a mere exercise of thought and instead has seen the light, in the flesh ( perhaps it would be more correct to say in wood and metal.. ). For this reason we are grateful to them and came naturally to us to spend a part of our energy and our time to promotion and tell the world about Fablab and Italian makers, a movement that will ensure, no way inferior to foreign.

Exactly at Fablab, observind the sperad of 3D printers in the maker’s world and understanding their potential, we have found two critical backgrounds: one linked to the cost of the materials, that did not line up at all with the falling prices of the machines, and the other linked to the large consumption of plastics material for the production of objects very often unnecessary or defective (waste , however, necessary since the period of great experimentation ) .

Here (ci si accende la lampadina) and borns Felfil wich is a small household filament extruder that aims to make cheaper the 3D printing prcocess and, at the same time, it allows to (operare in maniera etica) recycling one’s own plastic wastes. In practice, starting from a plastic granulate ( recycled or virgin ) is able to produce the filament used in the more common printers 3D FDM .

A good idea that we were not the only ones to have . In fact, in the period between the definition of the concept (2013) and the actual implementation ( June 2014) Many other similar projects are born , especially in the US , and some in Europe . But Felfil subtend a unique design and construction philosophy . The technical drawings and assembly instructions are open, freely downlodable from our website, both in Italian and English. In addition, most of our efforts have gone in the direction of making Felfil really an object autoproducibile with minimal material effort and cost. We are proud of the fact that about 40 % of the components used are recycled, in some cases directly saved from landfill. And also another 30 % is made up of standard material easily affordable worldwide.

All this to explain how this project for us is not only a research about systems and alternative production, but also and above all, a way to share our work in order to make possible for others to enjoy it and improve it, applying his ethics in concrete of his experience.

An open embrace to all.

C.C.