I am glad I ran across this post! I have been in the planning phase of my complete Iron Man build here for about two weeks. I went through many different options in fabrication, and initially wanted to try 16g sheets of Aluminum T6 (6061) but dropped that idea after realizing that the helmet alone would have around 80 different weld points.
After reading about the 2nd movie using 3D print to create the new suit, I began digging into the possibilities. I have already begun designing my pieces in 3DS Max, and got the helmet complete aside from the moving parts. Those will be added in AutoCad Inventor soon. I found many different 3D print shops that have a quick online quote system. You just upload your 3D model file, and you get an immediate estimate on cost.
I got 8-9 different estimates using my helmet design, and they were all over the place. The cheapest was $1,200 and the highest was over $3,000 on ShapeWays.com You can actually view my estimate (and order if your loaded) right here on their site ;-)
http://www.shapeways.com/model/118692/test.html&h=4c3ed
http://www.shapeways.com/model/118690/test.html
And I stuck a recording of my helmet rendering on Facebook that you can view here:
http://www.facebook.com/#!/video/video.php?v=1182930432488&ref=mf
So, like so many times before, my project has broken into many new projects. I found a free source community that has created blu-prints for building your own 3D printers at home, and have released all of the software, and guidlines you need to get one working for right around $500. Now, these aren't as high a resolution as your $30,000 printers, so you still spend allot of time sanding, smoothing, and dremmilling out pre-defined holes etc. But, it looks like it will get the job done.
Here is the main page of their development community:
http://objects.reprap.org/wiki/Main_Page
These have a limitation of around a 9" sq print area, so in taking on this new 3d printer project, I have decided to attempt the completion of a concept printer a gent designed in Germany. We have been going over the details this week, of what it will take to get built and running.
This printer has a 1mx1mx1m build area, so I will not need to break my large pieces like the chest into multiple sections. I have also found some higher grade extruders that give better resolution, and faster speeds that I plan on building into this new model.
Here is the page for his project:
http://lebigrep.org/
If only I had the skills of Mr TMP here, it wouldn't take this much work to build. But, the thought of having a large scale working 3D printer sitting in my office, has me extremely excited!!!
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