All posts filed under: Technology

Metal Castings – Investment Castings

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Additive technologies involve the use of injection molds which can produce components faster and at lower costs than the traditional use of subtractive technology. Additive technologies can be utilized as investment casting patterns. Casting methods are one of the first industrial processes developed by humans and have been utilized for thousands of years. The results can yield detailed and intricate results. One of the first materials used for the casting process was bees wax. This process is so adaptable that the forms of the bees have been used as patterns for producing detailed and stunning gold jewelry. One of the modern applications for additive casting patterns is creating environmentally friendly and socially conscious jewelry. On the other end of the spectrum, applications for casting patterns have produced products that contain a variety of metals and can weigh several hundred pounds. Additive casting patterns involve a thick coating or investing, which is a pattern that melts or burns out quickly as opposed to a material like ceramic, which doesn’t. A gate can be built into the …

3D Printing Stores and Labs in Berlin

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The idea of accessibility is being used in Berlin because it is believed that everyone should have the ability to become a maker and have access to 3D files, 3D printers, and 3D modeling software. Platforms, such as Thingivers; software, such as Meshmixer; and 3D printers are now available for affordable prices. As a matter of fact, there have been a growth spurt in this accessibility over the previous years. Places like universities have this technology available within their facilities, so that students can develop and research in their fields. Recently, the Technical University of Berlin (TU), for instance, has taken it a step further by making the accessibility of additive manufacturing by opening a student run “3D Printing Repair Café”. This past April, the 3D Printing Repair Café celebrated its opening by providing students and even non-students with a space to try out the 3D printing technology. They can do this whether need a creative design model, a spare bicycle part, or just a custom made gift. Also, the space consists of Ultimaker brand …

Functional Parts and Tools by Additive Fabrication – Direct Fabrication and Indirect or Secondary Processes

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Additive fabrication is a class of manufacturing procedures where a part is built by adding material layers upon one another. This process has been evolutionary in different manufacturing applications. And as a result, it is now an accepted solution in fabricating customized, geometrically complex, or low volume parts, and it’s recognizable in producing tools and parts that are not possible to combine and form into various materials. Though many applications are hidden from the public and are still in development, their ranges are potentially vast. Even some of the technology’s liabilities are transformed into advantages. Also, additive technology is utilized by directly fabricating items, such as molds and parts, or it is utilized through secondary or indirect purposes. Direct Fabrication Plastic and metal parts are often directly fabricated. With plastic parts, stereolithography, thermoplastic extrusion methods, and laser sintering (LS) are currently the most important forms used in direct fabrication. Stereolithography is a process in creating objects that are three dimensional with using a laser beam controlled by a computer that builds the required structure from …

Additional Organizations

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There are additional companies that produced 3D printing systems. Formlabs, PP3DP Company (China), Ultimaking Ltd. (Netherlands), and Solidoodle just to name a few. Formlabs, based in Massachusetts, was founded in 2011 was well known for raising close to $3 million in a Kickstarter campaign, and for also creating the Form 1 and Form 2 3D printers. Formlabs and PP3DP Company Formlabs was founded by Maxin Lobovsky, Natan Linder, and David Cranor. The three students met while students at MIT, in the Media Lab. They used their experiences at MIT, as well as Lobovsky using his experience with the Fab@Home project at Cornell University to create FormLabs. FormLabs was developed to create an easy-to-use and affordable desktop stereolithography 3D printer, while receiving early investing from Mitch Kapor, Joi Ito, and Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavor. FormLabs had been featured in a documentary, titled Print the Legend, which documented the stories of several leading companies in the 3D desktop industry. FormLabs was a leader in the 3D printing world. PP3DP Company (China), also known as Personal Portable 3D …

3D Systems

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3D systems, a comprehensive set of products and services, that included 3D printers, print materials, on-demand parts services, and digital tools. The 3D ecosystem helped support advanced applications from the product design shop to the operating room. 3D systems had the ability to simulate, do virtual surgical planning, and print medical and dental devices, as well as, provided patient-specific surgical instruments. The 3D system was the original 3D printer and shaper of future 3D solutions, allowing companies and professionals to optimize their designs, bring to life their workflows, be innovative in their products and deliver new business models. The Early Beginnings 3D systems was founded in Valencia, California, by Chuck Hull, the patent-holder and inventor of the first stereolithography (SLA) rapid prototyping system. Before the SLA rapid prototyping was introduced, prior models were expensive and took time to create. With the introduction of solid-state lasers in 1996, Hull and his 3D team were allowed to reformulate their materials. Hull was replaced by Avi Reichental in 2013, while Hull remained an active member of3D systems’ board …

Rep Rap Organization Project

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The RepRap Printer, also called the Replicating Rapid Prototyper, was created as a starting point for the British to develop a 3D printer. This 3D printer would be able to make a copy of its own items, at a low cost. With the RepRap able to make copies of its own items, the makers envisioned the possibility of the RepRap units being cheap, allowing the manufacture of more complex products without having to use complex industrial infrastructure to make them. An initial study done on the RepRap supported the claim that by using RepRap to print common products, there were major economic savings. These saving were also more cost efficient since the RepRap printers was able to clone themselves. Making the savings even greater. RepRap, started by Dr. Adrian Bowyer in 2005, a mechanical engineering lecturer at the University of Bath, UK, was first prototyped in September 2006. Adrian Bowyer, a British engineer and mathematician, after spending twenty-two years as a lecturer, then retired from academic life. The first model of the RepRap successfully printed …

Fab@Home Organization

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Fab@Home, the first multi-material 3D printer made available to the public, was also one of the first two open-source do-it-yourself 3D printers. The other printer was the RepRap. The goal of the Fab@Home project was to change the high cost and closed nature of the 3D printing industry by creating a low-cost, versatile, open printer. Since the Fab@Home release in 2006, there had been hundreds of Fab@Home 3D printers built across the world. The design elements of Fab@Home could be found in many do-it-yourself printers, more often in the MakerBot Replicator. The Fab@Home project was closed in 2012 once the project’s goal was achieved and distribution of do-it-yourself printers were outpaced by the sales of industrial printers for the first time. Creating a Fabrication System with Low Costs Fab@Home was started in 2006 by Professor Hod Lipson and Evan Malone of the Cornell Computational Synthesis Lab. While attempting to design a robot that could reprogram itself and produce its own hardware, Lipson discovered the need for a rapid-prototyping fabrication machine. The technology for the rapid-prototyping, …

MakerBot Industries

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MakerBot Industries, founded in 2009, in New York by Bre Pettis, Adam Mayer, and Zach Smith, was created to engineer and produce 3D printers, using the RepRap 3D printer as their model. Zach Smith was one of the founding members of RepRap Research Foundation, a non-profit program that helped in early research for open-source 3D printers. Bre Pettis, during an art residency in Vienna with Johannes Grenzfurthner/nomochrom in 2007, wanted to create a robot that would print shot glasses for the Roboexotica event and found, while researching, information on the RepRap 3D printer. The MakerBot’s consistent theme throughout their history was shot glasses. Founding, Stocks and Closure – The Company’s History MakerBot started shipping kits in 2009, selling roughly 3,500 units. With demand for the kits being so great, MakerBot owners decided to provide parts for future 3D printers from their own company. Funding for the future printers, was in part provided by Adrian Bowyer, the founder of RepRap, who put up $25,000. The Foundry Group, in 2011, invested $10 million into MakerBot and joined …

Insights into Continuous Liquid Interface Production (CLIP) and Digital Light Processing (DLP) 3D Printers

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3D printing technology is often used to construct highly complex objects of different kinds, properties and materials. Despite its numerous advantages, one major drawback of 3D printers is its traditionally slow speed. For instance a typical 3D printing machine such as Stereolithography (SLA) can take several hours to print a 55mm diameter object and maybe several days to complete a larger object. To overcome this major industry challenge, several 3D companies have come up with more updated and efficient technologies that guarantee quick speeds and utmost accuracy. The modern technologies include Continuous Liquid Interface Production (CLIP) and Digital Light Processing (DLP). a) Digital Light Processing (DLP) DLP is a type of stereolithography that is popular for performing rapid prototyping services. The technology uses projector light to perform photo-sensitive polymer cures instead of the traditional laser beam. Although DLP was first developed in 1987 by Larry Hornbeck of Texas Instrument, the first printed installation of 3D printed model with photopolymer technology was published in 1981 by Hideo Kodama of the Nagoya Municipal Industrial Research. DLP prototyping …

Extrusion deposition: Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM)

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Fused Deposition Modeling stands out as one of the most commonly used additive fabrication techniques. A 3D company called Stratasys uses FDM as trademark as such various open source community entities and vendors to use the term thermoplastic extrusion when talking about the same technology. Printers that use FDM technology are designed to create 3D objects, one layer at a time, beginning with the bottom part. Foto by Markelapellaniz How Fused Deposition Modeling System Works The development process technique involves heating and thermoplastic filament extrusion. During the pre-processing period, 3D CAD file provides an accurate path that helps facilitate thermoplastic extrusion. When the production process kicks in, the thermoplastic is heated and transformed into a liquid state by the 3D printer. The material is then deposited along the extrusion bath in the form of fine beads. The production process also involves buffering and removal of 3D scaffolding material. The final FDM post-processing process involves breaking off the support material. Some of the key components in a typical FDM machine include thermal housing, extrusion nozzle, plastic filament …