A Web-based custom service system for rapid prototyping

With the ability of providing manufacturing services for geographically distributed customers on Internet, the tele-manufacturing for RP has shown its great importance and urgency for grabbing the RP service market. In this paper, an online custom service system for rapid prototyping on the Internet is presented. The whole working process of the platform is composed of two operational modules, online business and tele-manufacturing & service set. Each functional unit of the platform is analyzed and implemented. Special attention was paid to the pricing system working on Internet, and as the result of our effort, a stereolithography-oriented online pricing engine (OPE) was developed. Its detailed algorithms is presented and discussed. It is based on the accurate build-time prediction and programmed using the application of ActiveX controls.