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3D Printing News Briefs: January 16, 2020

In today’s 3D Printing News Briefs, we’ve got a little business news, followed by stories about materials, and finally ending with some 3D printed fashion. PostProcess Technologies is expanding in Japan with a new partnership. Smart International has launched a material partnership program, and CRP Technology is introducing a new Windform material. Finally, a Spanish fashion brand is using BCN3D’s technology to make some of its clothing.

PostProcess Technologies Enters Asian Market with New Partnership

Executives from PostProcess and K.K. IRISU (C. ILLIES & CO., LTD.)

Automated post-printing solutions provider PostProcess Technologies Inc. announced that it’s entering the Asian additive manufacturing market, and expanding the reach of its solutions, by naming K.K. IRISU (C. ILLIES & CO., LTD.) as its first distribution partner in Japan. PostProcess chose the high-quality industrial machinery and technologies specialist, to help serve its growing base of customers in Japan and represent its data-driven technologies because of its expertise and experience. The partnership is mutually beneficial, as ILLIES can now offer its customers access to technology that will automate common post-printing processes and enable “additive manufacturing at scale.”

“K.K.IRISU’s main objective is to educate the Japanese market in additive manufacturing and to continue to be the solution provider for the Japanese 3D manufacturing world. We feel that by adding PostProcess Technologies to our lineup, will help assist the Japanese market to compete with other countries in Additive Manufacturing as well as globally maintain the high standards of the tag ‘Made in Japan’,” said Dr. Frank Oberndorff, President of K. K. IRISU.

Next month, both companies will exhibit at the Design Engineering & Manufacturing Solutions (DMS) 2020 Expo.

Smart International Introduces Material Partnership Program

This week, Smart International, the global brand licensee in 3D printing for KODAK, announced the launch of a new Materials Partnership Program in order to help its customers achieve a repeatable 3D printing experience, while also meeting the demand for high-quality, yet easy-to-print, engineering materials. The company has already developed, and tested, material profiles for filaments from its partners BASF, Clariant, and DSM, which will help provide optimal conditions for these third party materials on the Portrait 3D printer. Print profiles were created from this data, and can either be accessed from the KODAK 3D Cloud or downloaded from the Smart3D website.

“We feel it is of vital importance to continually adapt to the ever-evolving 3D printing market. Partnering with top filament companies like BASF, Clariant and DSM gives the customer the opportunity to choose the material that best fits their project, and gives them confidence to use these high-quality 3rd party materials with the KODAK Portrait 3D Printer,” said Roberto Gawianski, the CEO of Smart International. “We are pleased to be able to assist in the development and evolution of 3D printing filaments, and will continue to support progress in this area.”

BASF material profiles include Ultrafuse ABS Fusion+, Ultrafuse PAHT CF15, Ultrafuse PA, and Ultrafuse Z PCTG, while Clariant now has a profile for its popular 20% carbon fiber-reinforced polyamide 6/66 PA6/66-CF20 filament. Smart International also created material profiles for DSM’s Novamid ID1030, Novamid ID1030 CF10, a carbon fiber filled PA6/66 copolymer filament and Arnitel ID2060 HT.

CRP Technology’s New Windform P2 Material

Italian company CRP Technology is introducing the latest material from its Windform P-LINE range – the glass fiber-reinforced thermoplastic polyamide Windform P2, which the company states has “excellent mechanical properties” for its High Speed Sintering (HSS) technology. The new material has high tensile strength (39.24 MPa), combined with increased stiffness (2925.20 MPa), and is great for insulating, as it is glass fiber-filled. Windform P2 is good for producing end-use parts that need high stiffness, as well as manufacturing components with detailed resolution.

“Windform® P2 is the second polymer from P-LINE, the new Windform® range of materials for high speed production-grade 3D printing, introduced on the market less than a year ago,” said Engineer Franco Cevolini, CRP Technology CTO and VP.

“This is a very important property. Windform® P2 is stiffer than Windform® P1 because Windform® P2 is reinforced (Windform® P1 is not reinforced). Most of the reinforced materials for similar technologies currently on the market, show a decrease in the tensile strength property. My staff and I have been able to preserve the high tensile strength in Windform® P2. Therefore, Windform® P2 overall’s performance is superior than the performance of similar materials currently on the market for similar technologies.”

ZER Collection 3D Printing Clothes with BCN3D

The 3D printed parts are made in TPU due to the flexibility of this material.

Spanish fashion brand ZER Collection introduced its first collection at the most recent Mercedes Benz Fashion Week in Madrid. The label, which was founded in 2017 by Núria Costa and Ane Castro and designs ‘futuristic, functional and urban clothing with sporty aesthetics,’ incorporated 3D printed parts, made with BCN3D’s Sigma printer, into 12 of the outfits; this system allows for the printing of two different materials, including flexible TPU. ZER Collection is using 3D printing in order to accelerate its production manufacturing processes and reduce waste, while also contributing to the use of sustainable new technologies in the apparel industry.

“We work much faster, because we can print two fabrics at the same time,” Costa said when explaining some of the benefits of using 3D printing to make their clothing, including their ability to “digitize all patterns in order to produce only the necessary fabric.”

“We believe that the use of 3D printing represents a revolution in fashion, in environmental care and in society.”

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

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Additive Manufacturing Could Prove Promising in Development of Hydraulic Pumps

Saimaa University of Applied Sciences thesis student, Daniil Levchenko, explores the capabilities of complex 3D printing in ‘Design of a Hydraulic Pump for Construction with Additive Manufacturing Tools.’ While was and is well aware of some of the more exaggerated claims often made regarding the magic of 3D printing, Levchenko dedicated his thesis to examining the potential for fabricating a hydraulics system.

Levchenko’s focus is on prosumers, a group of users operating at the more advanced level in AM processes. The initial step was to outline what would be required for the hydraulics unit, and then begin examining the options for materials. After that, the researchers would design the pump, create a 3D model, 3D print the parts, and hopefully, test it in a lab.

“The idea of this study takes its origins in an article dedicated to a project of a group of engineering students from the University of Rhode Island,” states the author. “They designed, constructed, and tested a stabilization platform that would allow them to negate turbulent sea conditions and to use a 3D printer on-board. As one of the students specified, the project was directed to aid work of research ships that were located far from shores and might be needed for timely replacement of any piece of equipment.”

Stratasys Object30 Prime (on the left) and BCN3D Sigma (on the right) (BCN3D Technologies 2019 & Stratasys Ltd. 2016)

The three-month study was made up of two different parts: theoretical, and then a discussion/conclusion. Testing was performed on a Stratasys Objet30 Prime and a BCN3D Sigma 3D printer, with thermoplastic polymers chosen as the material, and tested regarding how it would mix with oil.

Materials that are available for the 3D printers

There were many obstacles encountered during the study, and the hydraulic pump was not completed. While the CAD model of the external gear pump was designed, the project was brought to a halt indefinitely due to complexities with the motor and then lack of a successful PLC-based controller circuit. There were time constraints on the brief three-month project too, with the study finally ending when neither parts for the pump-motor assembly or construction of the piece were coming to fruition.

Proposed gear (driving)

And although there was not an actual product to show for the research, Levchenko still sees the system as promising for developing areas where devices can be created on-site and on-demand; in fact, such pumps could offer critical services in rural or isolated geographies, especially with an accessible, mobile 3D printer that could fabricate affordable parts for wells and other machinery like hydraulic levers.

“The results of the theoretical study could have been implemented in a real-life model build with printers provided by the university. To the greatest regrets of the author, the conditions of the available machines required maintenance and they could not be used for concurrent construction. It should be possible to recreate the designed pump and test in laboratory conditions to acquire actual empirical data about its performance and reliability and to the overall applicability. It would also prove the viability of the concept,” concluded Levchenko.

“Another field to enlarge and improve this study could be the widening of the spectrum of the assessed materials and manufacturing techniques. An assumption of the author is that consideration and usage of selective laser sintering technique may greatly aid design freedom and the final properties of the pump. The technique is capable of creating geometries with good tolerances and surface tolerances.”

3D printing has been used in the design and fabrication of many different parts and systems to aid in helping developing countries and individuals in isolated areas, from the creating of manifolds to other hydraulic development and customized robotics. What do you think of this news? Let us know your thoughts! Join the discussion of this and other 3D printing topics at 3DPrintBoard.com.

A scheme of PolyJet printing process (The Technology House/Sea Air Space 2019)

[Source / Image: ‘Design of a Hydraulic Pump for Construction with Additive Manufacturing Tools’]

The post Additive Manufacturing Could Prove Promising in Development of Hydraulic Pumps appeared first on 3DPrint.com | The Voice of 3D Printing / Additive Manufacturing.

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UPC Researchers Develop New Method of Designing Porous Scaffolds for FDM 3D Printing

Trabecular structure with thin walls.

From manufacturing customized prosthetics and implants to surgical planning and bioprinting organs and tissues, 3D printing has many medical applications. In terms of bone tissue engineering and 3D bioprinting, 3D printed scaffolds are used as templates to help with tissue formation and initial cell attachment, as well as to fix prostheses through osseointegration. We’ve seen scaffolds made with all sorts of materials, like a compound in turmeric, sugar, and plastic, but the best are those with good porosity that can simulate tissue.

It’s not always easy to fabricate porous structures with specific pore sizes using FDM technology. A trio of researchers from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC) in Barcelona published a paper, titled “3D Printing of Porous Scaffolds with Controlled Porosity and Pore Size Values,” explaining how they developed a new method of designing porous scaffolds for FDM 3D printing.

The abstract reads, “The present paper provides a methodology to design porous structures to be printed. First, a model is defined with some theoretical parallel planes, which are bounded within a geometrical figure, for example a disk. Each plane has randomly distributed points on it. Then, the points are joined with lines. Finally, the lines are given a certain volume and the structure is obtained. The porosity of the structure depends on three geometrical variables: the distance between parallel layers, the number of columns on each layer and the radius of the columns. In order to obtain mathematical models to relate the variables with three responses, the porosity, the mean of pore diameter and the variance of pore diameter of the structures, design of experiments with three-level factorial analysis was used. Finally, multiobjective optimization was carried out by means of the desirability function method. In order to favour fixation of the structures by osseointegration, porosity range between 0.5 and 0.75, mean of pore size between 0.1 and 0.3 mm, and variance of pore size between 0.000 and 0.010 mm2 were selected. Results showed that the optimal solution consists of a structure with a height between layers of 0.72 mm, 3.65 points per mm2 and a radius of 0.15 mm. It was observed that, given fixed height and radius values, the three responses decrease with the number of points per surface unit. The increase of the radius of the columns implies the decrease of the porosity and of the mean of pore size. The decrease of the height between layers leads to a sharper decrease of both the porosity and the mean of pore size. In order to compare calculated and experimental values, scaffolds were printed in polylactic acid (PLA) with FDM technology. Porosity and pore size were measured with X-ray tomography. Average value of measured porosity was 0.594, while calculated porosity was 0.537. Average value of measured mean of pore size was 0.372 mm, while calculated value was 0.434 mm. Average value of variance of pore size was 0.048 mm2, higher than the calculated one of 0.008 mm2. In addition, both round and elongated pores were observed in the printed structures. The current methodology allows designing structures with different requirements for porosity and pore size. In addition, it can be applied to other responses. It will be very useful in medical applications such as the simulation of body tissues or the manufacture of prostheses.”

Cross-section of specimen 1: (a) 3D view, and (b) 2D view.

In order to design 3D printed porous scaffolds that can simulate tissues, they need mechanical strength, which helps with protection and support; permeability, which can direct the transport of nutrients; and surface area and interconnectivity, both of which relate to good cell growth. Other researchers have tried to achieve the necessary porosity in scaffolds by using hierarchical design and topology optimization. But the UPC team went a different way.

“Unlike other methods that are based on truss structures, the present model allows obtaining irregular porous structures from random location of columns in the space, which leave voids among them. Specifically, the structure was modelled with parallel planes joined by columns, with a certain number of columns on each plane,” the researchers wrote.

They applied their model to a disc shape and defined three different variables:

  1. Distance between parallel planes
  2. Number of base points for columns on each plane
  3. Radius of each column

Then, the team used dimensional analysis to lower the number of process variables to just two, and so defined their requirements “for a specific application case: the use of a porous structure in external layers of hemispherical hip prostheses.”

Printed porous structure (rescaling of the designed scaffold by scaling factor of five).

To compare the results of their experiment with computationally calculated results, the researchers used a dual-extruder Sigma 3D printer from BCN3D to fabricate three sample scaffolds out of PLA, then measured their pore size and total porosity. The researchers found that the measured results were not dissimilar to the calculated results.

“In future work, other requirements for structures, related to either mechanical strength or mass transport, will be addressed. In addition, improvement of the FDM printing process is required in order to obtain more accurate and smooth parts,” the researchers concluded.

Co-authors of the paper are Irene Buj-Corral, Ali Bagheri, and Oriol Petit-Rojo.

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