More and more 3D printing “firsts” and rapidly prototyped innovations seem to relate to children products. In a way it is logical as they are the ones growing up in a world that is going to be a lot different, one where they will have just about everything made specifically for them. The NumNum Dip is one of these products, made specifically to cater to the needs of babies and made possible by the affordable prototyping capabilities of 3D printing technologies.
The NumNum Dip inventors, Doug Gonterman and Jessica Lineberry, could not understand why no one had yet developed a spoon that could help a kid get familiarized with the concept of “utensil” without spilling tons of food all over him or herself in the process.
“What we did find,” they explained, “is that most companies have focused their attention on the spoon. They have twisted and contorted it in an effort to diminish the mess. Still, the mess remains. Where are the training wheels of the utensil world, we wondered? We looked, there weren’t any. Until now.
The “utensil training wheels” do look like something straight out of the future (as many baby technologies do, in fact) and could not be any more different from traditional spoons and forks: a clear example of the out-of-the-box thinking made possible by 3D printing and modelling. They take the shape of two different bright plastic utensils, identical from the front and backside, perfectly child safe and soft to soothe their gums
One is open in the center and is thought out for more solid foods and older children, while the other has a dimpled surface and is used for liquid foods. To give them the correct shape so that they would be able to hold just the right amount of food, the inventors had a series of prototypes made in (presumably) biocompatible resin, through the SLA 3D printing process available at Solid Concepts.
3D Printing was a huge help through the development stage, as it allowed us to perfect our product features,” said Doug Gonterman. “With the first 3D prototype of NumNum the channels were a little different. Testing showed that the particular design didn’t allow for captured foods to be released easily.”
Just like the child learning to use a utensil for the first time, they were able to modify their concept and go right back to try again. “The next prototype worked like magic,” Gonterman revealed. “We prototyped to perfection. 3D printing is my preferred choice of prototyping; so easy, so affordable.” With 3D printing everything we have come to take for granted can be questioned: even the spoon. Check out some NumNum Dip action in this video
