Posted on

3D Printing News Briefs: September 18, 2018

We’re starting with a bit of business news in today’s 3D Printing News Briefs, then a story about metal 3D printing, and then moving along with examples of some of the amazing and innovative things people have been making with this technology. Sigma Labs has issued a letter to shareholders about some company changes, and a YouTube video introduces some new hard tool steels for 3D printing. WASP is carrying on with a major project by its Crane construction 3D printer, and a University of Minnesota professors talks about 3D printing electronics directly on skin. BMW Motorrad created 3D printed motorcycle components, and a Wisconsin sign company is using 3D printing for its products. Finally, Wrights Robotics made a full-sized, 3D printed, talking robot from a little 1980s movie called Short Circuit, and a low poly artist made some neat 3D printed chain mail.

Sigma Labs Says Goodbye to Mark Cola

Mark Cola

This past Friday, September 14th, Sigma Labs, Inc., which provides quality assurance software under the PrintRite3D brand, announced that its President, Co-Founder, and CTO Mark Cola would be retiring next month. After the news had time to settle over the weekend, the company announced the release of a letter to its shareholders from CEO and Chairman John Rice. In the letter, Rice paid tribute to everything Cola had done for the company over the years, and also assured shareholders “that the succession taking place is smooth and secure,” noting that Cola’s internal management responsibilities will be covered by Sigma’s Vice President of Engineering Darren Beckett, while Dr. Martin Piltch will take over his role on the company’s outside team of technology consultants.

“We thank Mark as founder and a leader of Sigma Labs, for creating and driving a vision of advancing the Additive Manufacturing Industry’s ‘good’ 3D manufacturing technology to become a ‘great’ high-quality manufacturing technology assured by Sigma’s IPQA,” the letter reads. “We shareholders can thank Mark for building and leading the multi-discipline technology team that is commercializing our robust data-rich analytical and interactive software – hardware tools that promise to add real value to an industry that needs such a tool. Yes, Mark now surely has the right to step back. Thank you and well done, Mark Cola!”

Here at 3DPrint.com we’ve met with Mark and have been very impressed with his deep 3D Printing knowledge and his vision on 3D printing for manufacturing and know he’ll be sorely missed at Sigma Labs.

Hard Tool Steels for SLM 3D Printing

Formetrix Metals, a brand new company I’d not heard of before today, recently posted its first video about its use of BLDRmetal steel alloys for laser powder bed fusion 3D printing. The 3D printable hard tool steel was used to make industrial dies for rolling bolt threads, after the dies made with CNC machining had failed.

After designing the dies, new BLDRmetal tool steel was used to 3D print prototypes. Once the surface finish was complete on the prototype dies, they were able to achieve high toughness and a high case hardness of up to 74 HRC.

WASP Crane Construction 3D Printing

WASP (World’s Advanced Saving Project) is well-known for its large-scale construction 3D printers, and for the last two years has been working to develop a new one, called the Crane or “the infinity 3D printer.” Evolved from the BigDelta 12M, the Crane is a modular 3D printing system with different configurations to choose from. Next month in Italy, WASP plans to present the Crane to the public in Massa Lombarda, which is where the village of Shamballa is being 3D printed.

On October 6th and 7th, a program will be held surrounding the introduction of both the WASP Crane 3D printer and the Gaia Module, a 3D printed earth house. According to WASP, Gaia is “the first module in soil ever realized with the 3d print- technology.” For more information on the event, visit the WASP website. You can see the new Crane 3D printer in action below:

3D Printing Electronics on Skin

While augmenting humans with electronics that can monitor our vitals, enhance our senses, and provide us with real-time information may sound like just an episode out of new science fiction series Glimpse, from Futurism Studios and DUST, the idea of advanced wearable electronics is not so far-fetched. Researchers like Michael McAlpine, a 3D printed electronics expert and mechanical engineering professor at the University of Minnesota, are working to improve upon existing technologies to make this fantasy a reality. This spring, McAlpine published a study that demonstrated how to 3D print electronics directly onto skin with an inexpensive, self-made 3D printer and ink made from silver flakes. Recently, Futurism interviewed McAlpine about his research, and his thoughts on the future of 3D printable electronics.

“All of these technologies we’re developing will lead to the post-computer era. You’re basically going from 2D to 3D [microchips to integrated circutry], which is essentially what biology is. So, that’s where the merger of electronics and biology is going to happen. Any privacy or ethical issues that spring from that aren’t going to be much different from the ones that we have with current electronics,” McAlpine said.

3D Printed Motorcycle Components 

The motorcycle brand of German automotive company BMW, called BMW Motorrad, recently developed a new motorcycle that’s full of 3D printed components and parts. This is not surprising, considering the parent company’s love for and use of 3D printing for both its regular and concept automobiles – BMW has been using 3D printing to build its cars for nearly 28 years.

3D printing can achieve parts with complex geometries, which is why it’s a perfect technology for the automotive industry. BMW Motorrad’s special concept motorcycle, called the S1000RR, demonstrates how the company can build new components using rapid prototyping technologies, as it is made of many 3D printed parts, such as a swingarm and an aluminum chassis. Take a look for yourself in the video below:

3D Printing Signs: Beneficial or Not?

Adam Brown in the shop at Sign Effectz.

Four years ago, a sign making company called Fastsigns decided to adopt 3D printing in three of its major markets – Chicago, Milwaukee, and San Diego. Fastsigns isn’t the only company to use 3D printing to make signage – a Milwaukee business called Sign Effectz, which was first founded in the company president’s garage in 1996 and now resides in a 17,000-square-foot facility, decided to explore 3D printing a few years ago, because it could open new ways of customizing signs and make it simpler and less expensive to produce small batches of custom products. But, workers in skilled trades may not appreciate the technology quite as much.

“Your fabricators on the floor now turn into (computer-aided design) modelers. I did. I love it. I came from busting my knuckles and dropping stuff on my toes and wasting material to problem solve and figure out how to build something… to getting to the 3D CAD modeling world where you can do all of that stuff in a virtual world and make sure 1,000 pieces all match and align and run it through animation to see if it works,” said Adam Brown, the President of Sign Effectz, before noting the potential downside of the technology.

“I wonder if you’ll be able to maintain the level of interest and passion in 3D CAD modeling because there’s little pain associated with it all of the sudden. It’s just a mental math problem and you hit print.”

In my opinion, products like custom signage are one of the many applications for which 3D printing is perfect. Using 3D design and CAD software to create signs is still a creative way to build something, even if you’re not manufacturing every bit of the sign by hand.

Full-Size 3D Printed Johnny 5 Robot

If you’re a fan of 80s movies, then you surely know of Short Circuit, starring such well-known actors of the decade like Steve Guttenberg and Ally Sheedy. With the tagline “Life is not a malfunction,” the movie tells the story of Number 5, one of a group of experimental military robots. When the robot is struck by lightning and electrocuted, he suddenly gains self-awareness and intelligence, and flees the laboratory, as he is afraid of being reprogrammed. He is later rechristened as Johnny 5.

Wrights Robotics recently completed its own life-size, 3D printed version of the Johnny 5 robot, and published a YouTube video showing its audio, neck motor, and lip light tests. Just like the real Johnny 5, this 3D printed robot moves, lights up, and talks, even uttering the movie phrase “Don’t disassemble Number 5!”

3D Printed Chain Mail 

If you’re a frequent visitor to Renaissance festivals, then you’ve no doubt seen plenty of chain mail in your day. But Agustin Flowalistik, a low poly 3D printing artist based in Madrid and the Fablab manager of Tecnolab, decided to create his own chain mail – of the 3D printed variety, of course. If you want to make your own, Flowalistik has made the files available for download at Cults3D, Thingiverse, and MyMiniFactory.

“The chainmail size is 195x195mm. A 60x60mm sample is available to test and find the right settings before printing the big chainmail. Print the model with a 0.4mm nozzle and 0% infill,” Flowalistik wrote in the Thingiverse description for the 3D printable chainmail.

Discuss these stories and other 3D printing topics at 3DPrintBoard.com or share your thoughts below. 

Posted on

Student Competition Team Uses 3D Printing and Design to Build Elements and Furniture for Lotus House

Lotus House installed in the northwestern city of Dezhou as part of Solar Decathlon China 2018.

We have plenty of evidence to support the fact that 3D printing is definitely in the running to change the way we construct houses and other structures. For the last eight months, a group of students from Washington University in St. Louis, with support from the university’s International Center for Energy, Environment and Sustainability (InCEES), have been hard at work building the elements for Lotus House – an energy-efficient housing prototype that will compete in the upcoming Solar Decathlon China 2018.

Of course, Team WashU, consisting of students from both the School of Engineering & Applied Science and the Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts, is relying on 3D printing to design and fabricate these housing elements for the single-story, 650 square-foot Lotus House. The circular structure is fascinating, made of overlapping curved panels that are set around a main, central axis – just like a lotus flower that’s blossoming.

Kinga Pabjan

“We were inspired by the beauty, delicacy and cultural importance of the lotus,” said Lotus House Project Manager Kinga Pabjan, a master’s candidate in architecture and construction management. “But we didn’t start with the lotus. Our initial intention was to use emerging technologies, particularly additive manufacturing, to create organic form. We wanted to challenge the possibilities of 3D printing.

“We also wanted to create an open environment that allows for natural human circulation and promotes healthy feng shui. The floor plan suggests the cycle of daily living: coming home, preparing food, relaxing with others, readying for bed. Curved sliding doors enable occupants to maximize flexibility and change the spatial flow.”

Pabjan said that the Lotus House is the only non-orthogonal design in the Solar Decathlon China, as circular buildings can reduce the amount of wasted space in houses.

While most of the competition projects can take years to complete, Team WashU finished Lotus House in only eight months. The students had prior experience with design-build competitions, having two years preparing and constructing the solar-powered, concrete CRETE House for the 2017 US Solar Decathlon.


“For Solar Decathlon China, we met twice a week, and more frequently near the end of the spring semester, when we were 3D printing furniture and wall samples,” Pabjan explained.

“Each student focused on a given task: landscape, furniture, interior, structure, etc. We typically worked in pairs, then brought what we produced to the group. Everyone would gather around a large table, with (faculty adviser) Hongxi Yin, to discuss and design together.

“Then, the team had to figure out how to turn that design into reality.”

A 3D printed side table.

While still in the US, Team WashU partnered up with Additive Engineering Solutions (AES), headquartered in Akron, Ohio, to 3D print a sample wall framework and some furniture pieces, such as a small side table. Then, once the team arrived in China, the students spent over a month working with Beilida to make the roof and the walls for Lotus House, in addition to finalizing things like the electrical systems, floors, HVAC, and insulation, before starting construction last month.

When asked what inspired Team WashU to 3D print custom frameworks to use as molds for the house’s concrete side panels, Pabjan answered:

“The sustainability benefits. A typical wooden formwork can only be reused two or three times before it’s tossed into a landfill. The initial price of a 3D-printed mold is higher, but it can be reused a hundred times. 3D-printed formworks also create far less waste, use a fraction of the energy and save time, since fabrication can begin as soon as the digital description is created.

“And the design possibilities are practically unlimited! 3D-printed molds eliminate traditional manufacturing-process restrictions. Our exterior roof and wall panels have a unique parabolic design that carries organically to the interior. The panels fit together like overlapping petals.”

Pabjan says the team learned a lot while working on the project, as many architects “may not fully understand how a building is fabricated” because they aren’t often on the actual construction sites.

“So to have this hands-on experience was extremely rewarding,” Pabjan said.

“At this stage in our careers, to be managing actual projects and construction jobs is just invaluable.”

The student members of the WashU team are very proud at how the Lotus House, with its 3D printed elements, turned out in the end.

“Lotus House is extremely ambitious in terms of the technologies used, the complexity of the form and the tight timeline,” Pabjan explained. “We also were trying to push the boundaries of what people are willing to do at Solar Decathlon. And after installing the first wall panel, we knew that it was going to be a success.

“As 3D printing becomes more affordable to the construction industry, I think we’ll see a lot more organic designs produced.”

Lotus House, interior view.

Discuss this story and other 3D printing topics at 3DPrintBoard.com or share your thoughts in the Facebook comments below.

[Images: Team WashU]

Posted on

Sand 3D Printing Used to Create Smart Slab Ceiling for ETH Zurich’s DFAB House

Last year, a project began, led by ETH Zurich and centered around the fabrication of a multi-story house called the DFAB House. The structure would showcase multiple technologies being developed at the university, including a 3D sand printing technique. Now the team has completed what is known as the Smart Slab, a panel that will be the DFAB House’s ceiling. At its thinnest point, the Smart Slab is only 20 mm thick, but it’s strong, and while it wasn’t 3D printed directly, the mold for the slab was made from a 3D sand printer, making it the first full-scale architectural project to use 3D sand printing for its formwork.

The ceiling is 80 meters squared, weighs 15 tonnes and consists of 11 concrete segments that connect the lower floor with the two-story timber space above. One advantage of using 3D printing for the mold instead of using a direct layer-by-layer concrete process is that high performant fiber-reinforced concrete can be used, and it can be fabricated with millmeter precision.

The Smart Slab was developed by the research group of Benjamin Dillenburger, Assistant Professor for Digital Building Technologies at ETH Zurich. The group developed a new software to create the formwork elements; the software is able to record and coordinate all parameters relevant to production. The team entered basic data such as room dimensions as well as a scan of the curved wall that will support the ceiling. This allowed them to adapt the geometry of the slab so that at each point it was applied only as thick as structurally necessary to support the force flow.

“We didn’t draw the slab; we programmed it,” said Mania Aghaei Meibodi, Smart Slab project lead and senior researcher in Dillenburger’s group. “It would not have been possible to coordinate all these aspects with analogue planning, particularly with such precision.”

The ceiling is composed of ribs of different sizes. The main ribs carry the loads, while the smaller filigree ribs are primarily for acoustics and aesthetic appeal. The lighting and sprinkler systems are integrated directly into the slab structure; they were coordinated with the planning software as well.

Several partners worked on the Smart Slab after its design had been exported from the computer. One industry partner produced the 3D printed sand formworks, which were divided into pallet-sized sections for easier printing and transport. Another partner fabricated the timber formwork through CNC machining, which gives shape to the upper part of the Smart Slab and leaves hollow areas that reduce weight and create space for electrical cables. A third partner brought together the two types of formwork, spraying the fiber-reinforced concrete onto the sand formwork to produce the lower concrete shell and casting the remaining concrete into the timber formwork.

The 11 individual concrete segments were transported to be building site after hardening for two weeks. A crane placed the concrete elements onto the load-bearing wall, where the prestressing took place. Steel cables were pulled lengthwise and crosswise through the concrete support and into the channels already inserted in the formwork. Tensioning the cables significantly increases the system’s load capacity.

“It was spectacular to see on the construction site how seamlessly our elements fitted with each other and with the existing components of the DFAB House,” said Dillenburger. “We owe this in part to the outstanding interdisciplinary collaboration with our partners. The meticulous work that we had invested into planning completely paid off.”

ETH Zurich has become well-known for its work with advanced 3D printing and robotics research. The university has developed numerous new digital fabrication technologies, several of which are being utilized in the construction of the DFAB House. The house is being constructed at Empa and Eawag‘s NEST research and innovation facility. You can learn more about the DFAB House here.

Discuss this and other 3D printing topics at 3DPrintBoard.com or share your thoughts below.

[Images: ETH Zurich]

Posted on

3D Printing News Briefs: July 10, 2018

We’re starting things off with a little business in today’s 3D Printing News Briefs, then moving on to news from the medical and construction industries, and finishing up with a few fun stories to make you smile. First up, Jeff Immelt, the former CEO of General Electric, has joined the board at Desktop Metal, and an industrial 3D printer distributor is offering a new cleaning unit by Omegasonics to its customers. Moving on, Insight Medical and Onkos Surgical are exploring the use of augmented reality in musculoskeletal oncology together, while Australian researchers introduced a new model for large-scale 3D facial recognition and a family has officially moved into the Nantes 3D printed house. Finally, a vegan confection startup is selling its popsicles, made with 3D printed molds, at select Starbucks locations in Los Angeles, and an EnvisionTEC 3D printer is being used to create characters for a stop motion series about superheroes.

Desktop Metal Board Welcomes Jeff Immelt

Jeffrey Immelt

Leading metal 3D printing company Desktop Metal, located near Boston, was founded three years ago with the goal of making metal 3D printing an essential tool for engineers and manufacturers. The company announced today that it has elected a new member to its Board of Directors – Jeffrey Immelt, the Chairman and CEO of GE until he retired from the company last year after 16 years. Immelt, who began his tenure only days before 9/11 and skillfully led GE through the crisis, has decades of experience, and is regarded as one of the most accomplished, innovative business technology leaders in the world. This makes him a valuable asset as Desktop Metal continues to grow.

“I am excited and honored to join the Desktop Metal board and work with this exceptional team of visionary entrepreneurs. Since it was founded nearly three years ago, Desktop Metal has become a trailblazer across the additive manufacturing landscape and I have a tremendous respect for the company’s ability to innovate,” said Immelt. “I look forward to sharing my experiences and contributing to the future direction and growth of this emerging metal 3D printing pioneer.”

Dr. Ken Washington, CTO and Vice President of Research and Advanced Engineering at the Ford Motor Company, was also recently appointed to the Desktop Metal board.

Industrial 3D Printer Distributor Offering Customers New Omegasonics Cleaning Unit

815BTX

Plural Additive Manufacturing, which is the exclusive North American distributor for industrial 3D printers by 3ntr, is offering the new 815BTX cleaning unit from ultrasonic cleaning systems leader Omegasonics to customers who purchase its 3D printers. The versatile and cost-effective unit is the 3D printing market’s first dual tank/dual action bench top ultrasonic cleaning machine, and can help easily remove water soluble support material.

The left tank of the 815BTX uses a biodegradable cleaning detergent developed by Plural, called BioSolv, while the right tank uses hot water; the model’s dual action then ensures the safe and efficient cleaning of 3D printed parts. The 815BTX also has programmable alternating cycles for hands-off cleaning.

“3ntr manufacturers’ of 3D printers utilize a variety of support materials, some require chemicals for support removal, while others need only hot water. The 815BTX eliminates the need to have two separate cleaning machines or deal with the cost of frequent cleaning detergent changes to get the job done,” explained Frank Pedeflous, the President of Omegasonics. “It’s an all-in-one solution.”

Onkos Surgical and Insight Medical Exploring Augmented Reality in Musculoskeletal Oncology

California medical device company Insight Medical Systems has partnered with Onkos Surgical, Inc. on a pilot project to explore different applications and opportunities for using Insight Medical’s ARVIS (Augmented Reality Visualization and Information System) headset in musculoskeletal oncology, and possibly tumor surgery. Still under development, ARVIS uses its tracking and visualization capabilities to deliver efficient and precise surgical plan execution. The headset can project virtual models of a specific patient’s anatomy and implants into a surgeon’s field of view during a procedure, in order to show hidden anatomical structures and important measurements.

“Onkos Surgical is investing heavily in capabilities and technology to bring innovation to musculoskeletal oncology surgeons,” said Onkos CEO and Co-Founder Patrick Treacy. “Augmented reality technology has the potential of simplifying the complex and providing surgeons with input and feedback that may improve the precision of surgical planning and interoperative workflow. This technology fits well with our portfolio of Precision Oncology solutions.”

University of Western Australia Introduces New Model for Large-Scale 3D Facial Recognition

2D facial recognition is used often for applications in the IT, security, and surveillance industries, and relies on a computer model to know whether a person is legitimate or not. But this method has several issues, such as data being easily accessible online, which aren’t the case with more advanced 3D models. 3D models can address changes in facial expression, poses, scale, and texture, but the data can be hard to gather. Now, researchers from the Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering at the University of Western Australia (UWA) have developed a first of its kind system that can complete large-scale 3D facial recognition. The researchers, who published a paper on their work in Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition, analyzed 3.1 million 3D scans of over 100,000 people, and trained the innovative new 3D Facial Recognition model (FR3DNet) to learn the identities of a large dataset of ‘known’ persons, then match a test face to one.

Dr. Syed Zulqarnain Gilani, who created the 3D model, said, “With off-the-shelf 3D cameras becoming cheap and affordable, the future for pure 3D face recognition does not seem far away.

“Our research shows that recognition performance on 3D scans is better and more robust. Your 3D scan could be in any pose, wearing glasses or a face mask, and laughing or just smiling and the deep model can recognise you in an instant.

“We hope that this research will help improve security on devices that use facial recognition to grant access to networks and systems.”

Nantes 3D Printed House Welcomes First Tenants

In 2017, a collaborative team of researchers in France began an ambitious project where an industrial 3D printer and a patented concrete construction process called BatiPrint3D were used to build a five-room house in just days. This spring, after 54 hours of 3D printing and four months of contractors adding the roof, windows, and doors, the team finished the 95-square-meter, environmentally-friendly YHNOVA house in the district of Nantes Bottière. The house features wheelchair access and digital controls, and its curved walls are said to reduce the effects of humidity. But it still only cost around £176,000 to build – 20% cheaper than an identical house manufactured with traditional methods. Now, the NMH Housing Award Committee has allocated the house to a French family, and Nordine and Nouria Ramdani, along with their three children, are being hailed as the world’s first family to live in a 3D printed house.

Nordine said, “It’s a big honour to be a part of this project.

“We lived in a block of council flats from the 60s, so it’s a big change for us.

“It’s really something amazing to be able to live in a place where there is a garden, and to have a detached house.”

The THNOVA team now believes they can 3D print the same house in just 33 hours.

Dream Pops Selling 3D Printed Popsicles at LA Starbucks

Vegan confection startup Dream Pops, headquartered in Los Angeles, creates organic, gluten- and soy-free, and vegan popsicles that are tasty, healthy, and made using 3D printed molds. These premier dairy-free popsicles consist of fruit and superfoods pureed together and cooled inside the molds at an accelerated rate with liquid nitrogen. Now, the startup has announced that its sweet treats are now available at five select Starbucks locations in the city – Third Street Promenade, La Brea and 4th, San Vincente and Barrington, Melrose and Stanley, and Wilshire and Santa Monica. The vegan ice cream pops, each of which contain fewer than 100 calories and seven grams of sugar, comes in five distinct flavors: Berry Dreams, Coconut Latte, Mango Rosemary, Vanilla Matcha, and a Dream Flight, which includes all four flavors.

“Our aim is to become the Willy Wonka of plant-based confections starting with our first product the Dream Pop and extending into adjacent better-for-you desserts,” said Dream Pops Co-Founder and CEO David Greenfield.

Dream Pops’ popsicles will be available at these Starbucks locations until October 5th.

3D Printed Stop Motion Characters

3D printing has been used many times to help create characters and backdrops for ads and commercials, music videos, and even movies that use popular stop motion animation. If you’re a fan of the stop motion show Robot Chicken, then you might also recognize the name of the full-service production company that creates it. California-based Stoopid Buddy Stoodios specializes in developing and producing stop-motion, CG, and 2D animated content, and also creates an animated stop motion comedy series called SuperMansion. The studio fabricates most of the show’s characters with a Perfactory 3D printer from EnvisionTEC.

“By utilizing 3D printing, we’re able to tell a story about superheroes and love and conflict and action and adventure,” said Kei Chong, Digital Design Supervisor at Stoopid Buddy Stoodios.

To learn more, check out the video below.

3D Printing for Animation | Stoopid Buddy Stoodios from EnvisionTEC on Vimeo.

Discuss these stories and other 3D printing topics at 3DPrintBoard.com or share your thoughts below.