Title: Re: 3D Printing
Post by: rachel on October 15, 2018, 04:18:57 pm
Yesterday I went to brunch with some friends and while walking to the table I noticed there was a chunk of discarded support material stuck to my dress
Title: Re: 3D Printing
Post by: ChrstphrR on April 26, 2023, 06:23:56 am
Boy am I reviving an old thread...
Still don't have a 3D printer here myself, but I caught wind of this company and their industrial 3D Printer through a 3D printer/scanner consulting company I follow just the other day:
The company's Impossible-Objects https://www.impossible-objects.com/ (https://www.impossible-objects.com/)
They've a process built toward higher end printing, and HIGH VOLUME printing.
Basically:
They print ink on non-woven composite fibre gauze sheets, off a roll, quite like a conventional paper printing press.
Plastic powder is layered on thin, like SLS printing, it sticks to the ink wetted parts, and they vaccum off the rest of the layer.
Each of the sheets is one layer of the part.
These sheets are stacked up, and when the layers are complete, the stack is pressed down to size in the Z direction, and the stack is heated above the plastic powder's melting point.
Because it's fused, all layers at once, there aren't the warping/internal stress issues like other processes. The rest of the non-woven sheeting that wasn't printed, in effect, acts as sacrificial support.
They note on the website, that they either "mechanically or chemically" remove the unused fibreglass or CF sheeting, and voila, you have your finished part. While all the videos I found, they mention sandblasting as the mechanical process, they don't mention the chemical options.
Tech specs I dug up... for their CBAM-25 printer they just announced:
Prints at up to 11L per hour of volume. The company curbs that back to a production steady 2.9L/hr with downtime for maintenance and switching out consumables
Even at just 2900 cm^3/hr, the process is around 15x faster than the fastest SLS printers
The printer is 20 x 5 x 5 ft. It reminds me, by the way it works, more like a high volume/high speed printing press in layout and size.
Runs on 220V, so not even needing three phase, like you'd expect with a large industrial machine about the size of a car
Right now they only offer two fibre media and two plastics, so a total of 4 composite combinations
No mention of cost on their site, brochures, so like ... Creaform and 3D scanners, this is gonna be a large company 5-6-7 figures purchase, not a remortgage the house and HELOC a maker garage sorta deal. They're courting electronics companies, aerospace, defence, and automotive suppliers as customers, so this is an early stage of announcement/availability.
My take, from the various manufacturing and other jobs I've taken over the years:
The machinery they use reminds me of the printing presses and other machinery used to press/cut/fold/collate. Paper and ink in one end, bound and cut magazines out the other end, into a stacker, automagically stacked, and the worker shoves the stacks into boxes and packs them up to the customer.
The process is a jump outside the box, and sure seems like it's scaleable, and likely with enough orders or funding, one or more of their customers will offer the one-off or small batch services like Shapeways/JLPCB do for 3d printing.
The build volume is a little ... short in the Z dimension. I realize that sounds like I'm complaining about a short dick, but ... 4 inches IS a little inadequate, no?
My hopes are that they're wildly successful.
Since it's unlikely in the short term that there'll be a DIY sort of solution, given patents, scale, and the higher cost of consumables (rolls of woven composites, sized plastic powders) I hope that the ability to scan/generate/design a part and get it printed out and mailed to you is a possibility.
It couples with 3D scanning and organic/iterative design of shapes near perfectly. I'll be showing this to my bro-in-law that runs the machine shop, to see what his reaction would be to that. I know this is outside the scope of what they do, as a machine shop, but I know he's open to the idea of expanding business/offerings. If he had enough demand for "you can't machine that part", maybe he could justify the big expenditure to cover parts offered by his shop?
Weazzy, what's your take with this, and ... ITAR? Could my hopes and dreams get dashed by the potential "weapons grade" capabilities of this being a general print-as-a-service offering?
Title: Re: 3D Printing
Post by: here cums the fuck truck on April 26, 2023, 06:49:39 pm
searching for "3d printing services" found shapeways, which boasts "10 3d printing technologies, 90 materials" so i guess they would be the kind of people to buy something like this.
i did not watch the video.
the use for this would be very, very niche. someone who has a sintering machine, and other rapid prototype machines, and then an engineer makes something that can't be prototyped easily and yet also he can't redesign around that. makes me think RF or other high precision applications.
idk what would you even make with this thing?
also i've had a 3d printer for over a year and haven't even taken it out of the box yet. i suck :/
Title: Re: 3D Printing
Post by: ChrstphrR on April 27, 2023, 10:00:00 am
the use for this would be very, very niche. someone who has a sintering machine, and other rapid prototype machines, and then an engineer makes something that can't be prototyped easily and yet also he can't redesign around that. makes me think RF or other high precision applications.
It sure is niche now. I'm expecting it'll be in the domain of the clients they're courting that have the deep pockets to pay. Aerospace/defense will pay top dollar. So, they'll have the first adopters to bootstrap more production, reduced cost, or improvements.
That it can print without warping, faster than sintering processes, and after sandblasting the unused woven layers away, and the surface finish is just about as good as a casting or injection molded part.
Anyone using this would have a batch of parts sandblasted, which would be the -only- real hands-on the printed product step, to keep things efficient.
As to what they could make? Given the narrow height vs length or width, this is a little restrictive.
But that leans toward largish flat things, about the size of a (small stack of) cafeteria serving tray(s).
Their one published case study is a good one: https://www.impossible-objects.com/solder-pallets/ (https://www.impossible-objects.com/solder-pallets/)
Made of PEEK+CF, you have a zero distortion jig that holds parts onto boards to run through a wave-soldering process, and survive thousands of cycles. So, they're already proving as a useful tool for high-temperature tooling for electronics. This sort of jig could be used with a pick and place - no human intervention except maybe feeding the machines doing the work with parts to be assembled.
I can see this being a useful process edging into the automotive/industrial realm:
Any sort of bracketry that fits in the 18x17x4" envelope, that is at the moment a cast metal bracket, would be the sort of thing targeted here by automotive suppliers, and auto-racing circles. Dimensional stability, and the opportunity to loose weight, but support the same forces and loads would again, be targeted on the higher end uses, and work their way down.
Title: Re: 3D Printing
Post by: nepnep on May 23, 2023, 07:26:10 am
Cool boardgame well built for your 3D printer.
Title: Re: 3D Printing
Post by: ChrstphrR on May 23, 2023, 07:42:04 am