Design a Car for 3D Printing. See It Made Live. (If You Win)

While the folks up in Manitoba at KOR EcoLogic are running a Kickstarter campaign to raise money to create the Urbee 2, a wholly 3D-printed vehicle, right now, Local Motors is, this very moment (until May 13, 2014), running, in cooperation with the Association For Manufacturing Technology (AMT), the 3D Printed Car Design Challenge. The winning design will be produced, in full-view, at the IMTS show in Chicago this coming September.

Jay Rogers, Local Motors CEO, said of the undertaking, “Historically, producing a new vehicle from a new design has represented a significant investment in tooling and a large commitment in time to integrate multiple structures and components. This effort to design and deliver the first co-created vehicle using this digital technology and manufacturing process could change the process and speed in which vehicles are designed and built.”

While the fabrication of the vehicle, which will have a battery-electric drive, will also include “subtractive manufacturing” techniques (i.e., 3D printing is considered “additive manufacturing,” so material removal is consequently “subtractive”), the centerpiece of the live undertaking at McCormick Place in Chicago the build of the vehicle on a BAAM machine—as in “Big Area Additive Manufacturing”—from Cincinnati Inc.

Interested designers ought to head over to Local Motors right now to learn about how to enter. The judges will include the Local Motors Community, as well as people including Bre Pettis, founder of MakerBot, and Doug Woods, president of AMT

And while it might be that having one’s design selected is its own reward, there are cash prizes, so if you need an additional incentive. . . .