Candyfab 4000.

Evil Mad Scientist Laboratories has combined two of their favorite things, geeky gadgets and sweets, in the Candyfab 4000. It’s a solid freeform fabrication machine that prints three-dimensional objects made of sugar!

The printing process begins with a bed of a granular printing media that has a fairly low melting point. Using a narrow, directed, low-velocity beam of hot air, we selectively fuse together the print media, forming a two-dimensional image out of the fused grains. We then lower the bed by a small amount, add a thin flat layer of media to the top of the bed, and selectively fuse the media in the new layer, forming a two dimensional image that is also fused to any overlapping fused areas in the layer below. By repeating this process, a three-dimensional object is slowly built up. At the end of the build, the bed is raised to its original position, disinterring the fabricated model, while unused media is reclaimed for use in building the next object.

The Candyfab 4000 will make its public debut next week at the 2007 Bay Area Maker Faire. Link