Universal Solid Fabricator

Universal Solid Fabricators, also called USFs or simply Fabricators, are an advanced automatic manufacturing technology. A USF can manufacture arbitrary structures from multiple materials by vaporizing and depositing small amounts of the materials. The machines are large, expensive, slow, and require large amounts of power, but the flexibility afforded by them more than compensates for these drawbacks. They are particularly used on deep space bases and long-range starships, where the ability to manufacture spare parts on-site is very valuable.