Uploaded December 2014 | Updated September 2026, 2 hours ago

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collectSPACE.com — NASA astronaut Barry "Butch" Wilmore, Expedition 42 commander aboard the International Space Station, installed Made In Space, Inc.'s 3D printer on Nov. 17, 2014. After two calibration test prints, ground controllers sent the printer the command to make the first printed part on Nov. 24: a faceplate for the printer's own extruder casing. This demonstrated that the printer can make replacement parts for itself.

The first part was 2.32 inches long, 1.61 inches wide, and 0.20 inches high and it was made out of ABS plastic, a common material often used to make LEGO bricks.

The first object 3D printed in space, the printhead faceplate, is engraved with names of the organizations that collaborated on this space station technology demonstration: NASA and Made In Space, Inc., the space manufacturing company that worked with NASA to design, build and test the 3D printer. Made In Space is located on the campus of NASA's Ames Research Center in Moffett Field, California.

The 3D printer uses a process formally known as additive manufacturing to heat a relatively low-temperature plastic filament to build parts layer on top of layer in designs supplied to the machine. These initial parts — primarily test designs — will be returned to Earth for detailed analysis and comparison to identical ground control samples made earlier this year with the same printer while it was at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama for testing before launch.

For more, see: collectspace.com/news/news-112514a-made-in-space-3d-printing.html

Video credit: NASA