Membership and Facilities

I am currently a student and I am interested in becoming a member of Dallas Makerspace. I have a few questions:

  1. I know that there is a discount for students. When I sign up online, where do I mention that I am a student?

  2. Before becoming a member, I would like to get a tour of the place. How do I sign up for the tour?

  3. How much does the Dallas maker space charge for 3D printing and what materials is the 3D printer capable of printing?

  4. If I want to use the machines but don’t know how to, will there be staff that will help and assist me?

  5. Does Dallas maker space have CNC machines and machines/tools which cut metal?

  6. Does Dallas maker space offer lessons, training, or classes?

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I’ll answer the ones I can.

3D Printing is “free” if you bring your own filament, otherwise it’s $0.10 per gram, regardless of whether the print failed or succeeded. You do need to pass the training on the printer, and one big caveat is that you cannot leave the makerspace while your print is running, and there’s a queue which is a waitlist by phone.

DMS has no staff. Period. Everyone is a volunteer, if you notice something not being done, take it upon yourself to do it yourself for yourself and others. You think something needs to change, take charge. It’s a bit of our motto.

With that said, I’ve only met one person at DMS that wasn’t friendly and wanted to help me with anything they had knowledge about. There are regular classes, and training is required (and therefor offered on a best try basis) for quite a few pieces of equipment. With the 3D printers specifically there’s a an online class that gets you started using them.

Yup. We have an entire machine shop. 3 Knee Mills (two are up an running right now iirc), 2 full size lathes, and a CNC mill. All require training, we have classes from time to time, they’re a few threads in the Members Only area of talk about it.

Yes. Check out https://calendar.dallasmakerspace.org for the most up to date list, and/or ask on talk if you want something specific. Most classes are “cheap” being a fee for the materials consumed in the class and the teachers are all volunteers.

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Contact [email protected] to see if you qualify for the discounted rate (from the wiki)

Ask here on Talk for a volunteer; it usually works best to mention days/times that are good for you, and areas of interest so our volunteers can do their best to match up

3D-Fab page on wiki has some info.

There will NOT. We have NO STAFF. You might be able to make friends and/or influence philanthropic members to assist…

Many, yes, from the HAAS and Dynatorch to the Shapeoko and Sherlines. Many of these have mentions/pages on our Tools page.

We do. That is our raison d’etre, as an education-based 501c3.


(from the wiki main page)

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“Student” covers a broad range of people. FYI, most of the larger power tools (i.e., most of woodshop, metal shop and machine shop) require you to be 18 to use those tools. You can look at our list of committees on our wiki and see any age requirements for that specific committee.

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If there is a particular CNC tool you are interested in, read the wiki entries about it. Search the wiki for it. Search Talk for it. Search the Talk section of that committee for related topics (limited if you’re not a member). Check the calendar for training for that machine - both in the future and in the past. If you still have questions about a machine, post on the committee’s area on Talk and tag the team leadership with @TeamUnderscoreCommittee - like @ team _ woodshop (without the spaces).

My opinion: If you’re considering joining DMS to access a particular tool, have a clear understanding from the committee leadership about how that access is be granted and what’s required to gain it, and how long it will likely take, before you sign up and start paying dues.

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