It is like watching the Phoenix — in a modern “real-time” rebirth — rise from its mythical ashes. Or like watching David — if time-lapse photography had existed back when Michelangelo worked his magic — emerge from a mere block of stone. In one contiguous, if only slightly monotonous, 44-hour melding of computer, plastic and laser beams, a company called Local Motors “3D-printed” a car.

Yes, an entire automobile. And not just a cute little plastic model of a car or an artist’s rendering of what a future car might look like, but a complete, full-sized, operational automobile. Having captivated onlookers by printing the basic carcass at the 2014 International Manufacturing Technology Show, Local Motors then added tires, headlights and the powertrain of a Renault Twizy electric car and drove its creation, the Strati, off the floor of Chicago’s McCormick Place convention centre.

And with that, the automobile industry is yet again transformed. Far beyond Local’s rather modest ambitions of building a low-cost urban electric vehicle, I suspect that, in fairly short order, there will be no aspect of the design, production, repair or customization that the 3D-printing process will not touch. You think electric cars are a revolution, wait till you see what computer-aided design and manufacturing can do!

For starters, the interminable process of building concept cars to test public reaction will suddenly become an (almost) instantaneous affair. Indeed, it will be hugely disappointing — and an indication of how hide-bound mainstream manufacturers have become — if someone doesn’t print off a concept car at one of next year’s major auto shows. Imagine the public relations coup of immediate crowd-sourcing; designers could, gathering information from show attendees, decipher the public’s real wants and desires, and, were they particularly fleet of pen, have the product of said amalgamated desire sitting on the showroom floor the next morning. Surely this is the immediate gratification that marketers say is necessary to get millennials interested in cars.

Nor will Boomers, especially those deep of wallet, be left behind by the 3D revolution. Just as in the days when custom coach builders like LeBaron and Henri Binder would fashion one-off creations based on chassis supplied by Duesenberg and Bugatti (none of the French company’s six famous Royales look the same or, indeed, were designed by the same person), luxury automakers like Rolls-Royce, Bentley and even lesser marques like Mercedes-Benz could once again offer the well-heeled an automobile completely unlike any other. Personalization need no longer be limited to interior baubles like big-screen TVs and garish purple alcantara leather, but true one-off fantasies only limited by the imagination of the designer and the constricts of mechanical — suspension mounting points, engine location, etc. — touch-points.

Restoration of priceless automotive artifacts will become much easier and notably less expensive. Why try to source a rare Packard door handle when its replacement is but a printed part away. Or, as famed car collector Jay Leno recently fashioned, a feedwater heater for his 1907 White Steamer. Indeed, the former Tonight Show host recently told Popular Mechanics that he is scanning an entire Duesenberg with an eye to recreating the body panels in the future. And as the technology speeds up — Leno says recreating his White feedwater heater took 33 hours — racers will be able to instantly repair their damaged racecar no matter how obscure the part destroyed. Can you imagine the outcome of a crash-plagued 24 Hours of Le Mans decided not by the speed of the race cars, but by the swiftness of a printer?

Even maintaining mainstream cars will eventually be touched by this revolution in (re)manufacturing. While small, inexpensive parts might not be efficiently produced individually, why in God’s name would anyone pay Porsche a gazillion dollars for the oft-crumpled rear three-quarter fender panel of a 911 when some pimply-faced teenager can email you an easily printable CAD file for a mere $15.95. Anoraks looking to extend the life of their coveted (by them only) Gremlin or Pinto will never again have to wade through Big Willie’s Junk Emporium and Automotive Graveyard desperately looking for a (relatively) rust-free door panel. One quick Google search will lead you to an AutoCAD replacement — colour-correct, of course, since hue will now be nothing more than a couple of lines of extra code.

Those currently plying their trade as customizers, meanwhile, may find their skills redundant. Why pay Chip Foose thousands of dollars to chop and channel your 1950 Mercury when a simple Command-P will spew out a completely singular creation, probably for a fraction of the cost. Indeed, the hot-rodder of the future may not be the grizzled artisan of the machine shop, scarred by years of arc welding and English wheeling, but a Red Bull-fuelled 15-year-old dweeb, fingers already carpal tunneled by incessant keyboarding.

I didn’t say everything about the future was going to be rosy.

3D-printed “Urbee” looks like the car of tomorrow

The Strati may be the world’s first 3D-printed car whose entire chassis is produced in one contiguous “printing”, but a Manitoba engineer named Jim Kor used 3D-printed parts to create his Urbee (for urban, electric and ethanol). Though not as elaborate a process — the body and interior are 3D-printed but the chassis is a traditional steel affair — or as large a car as the Local Motors Strati, Kor’s Urbee weighs but 545 kilograms and has an amazingly low drag coefficient of 0.15. Indeed, powered by an eight-horsepower hybrid powertrain, Kors says that the Urbee should be able to cross the United States on just five gallons (38 litres) of fuel.