i took a closer look in our what's next segment. reporter: you can make practically anything with a 3-d printer, all you need is filament the plastic feed-stock the printer uses to materialize your ite and tyler mcnaney invented
filabot, a machine to recycle plastic into filament. >> we're working toward being able to recycle the widest range of plastics, so like soda bottles, milk jugs, really any plastic you put in your recycling bin we want to be able to turn into a 3d print.
reporter right now his machines work with the kinds of plastic used for leggos, remote control cases, yogurt containers, even certain luggage and office items. and, of course, any 3-d print that didn't come out the way you planned. >> just put the plastic in a
grinder, and then put it in the filabo >> you put the pellets in an then there's a screw inside that pressurizes it, pushes it forward toward the heat zone which is the orange, and under there there's a heater that's up to whatever melt temperature of
the plastic; it heats it up and then squirts it out the nozzle. reporter: tyler and his team assemble and package the filabot in barre and continue to work on design. as 3-d printers become cheaper and better and more common, he says filabot has several selling
points >> it allows for really anyone to be able to have that closed-loop recycling right where they are. reporter: so it helps the environment and saves money. but he also says it allows people to customize their
filament. >> we have a plastic that we work with right now that has 80% brass in it and it's really heavy; it feels like the metal and you can polish it and make it look like the metal. reporter: he says a college used a filabot to make different
shaped tablets to test how the shape affected dispersion in the body he says that ability to make your own kind of filament has lots of big name companies buy filabot he says nasa, google-x, ford and toyota are all customers as well as the
pentagon. he's pleased with what he's done so far, but, i'm not done yet. he's planning for more models that work with more materials in
recycling plastic for 3d printing,an industry that he believes will continue to matter more and more with what's next, david
