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3DHubs Killing Off Its Community? 3D Printing Company Commits Suicide for No Reason.


3DHubs has grown by having a unique premise and idea. The 3Dhubs community of 3D printer operators from all over the world can sign up to 3DHubs and offer their 3D printers to others. I can send a part to 3DHubs, and it will be 3D printed locally by a neighbor or someone that lives close to my work. In this way, 3DHubs has been a vital connection point in the 3D printing community since its inception. The company has tens of thousands of people signed up to its network. So far 3DHubs has not really been imitated and copied, so it alone competes directly with Shapeways, i.materialise, and Sculpteo as a unique company. 3DHubs is different since it is a distributed manufacturing platform of independent operators across the world. This lead to support for 3DHubs stated goals of localizing manufacturing and making it more efficient.

It seems that the company is now turning its back on its roots and will focus solely on working with professional service bureaus to fulfill orders as per October 1st. A radical departure from the previous path and a radical going back on its community has confused many. The value of 3DHubs is in its community; the community gives it granular local presence and a barrier to entry. Now it is just like any 3D printing service upstart and will lose its community entirely. I’ve always liked 3DHubs, although I have been very skeptical of their Trends Report I like the company and what they’re doing. I liked the idealism coupled with business. I’ve also personally met with the founders who I consider to be nice and more importantly very capable 3D printing people. People who now have decided to create their own new Coke moment. I can not think of a business rationale for this nor can I fathom why they would do this in this way. Even if 3DHubs thought that the future of its business is in working only with 3D printing services, then it can still support its community? Why wreck a marketing and possible monetization instrument like that? It could through content, product sales, courses, support or any number of ways profit and help its existing community of tens of thousands. So even if it would move to service bureaus, then I would still recommend that they coddle and keep the one thing that makes them unique.

I’m not the only one that is confused by this; these are just some community member responses today:

MikByte @viperz28
Why? Don’t you plan on screwing over the 3d printing community due to greed.

“With #3dHubs dropping smaller independent printer hubs starting Oct, what are other comparable P2P options out there? #3Dprinting #makersgonnamake

2lol555@2lol555
A big F you to @3DHubs today! Switching over from “Locally sourced 3D prints” to the “Closed manufacturing program” basically… This was a big reason for me to own a 3d printer… now it’s all gone!

Buildingthings

“Dear 3DHubs, Get f-ed. That is all.
Sincerely,

The People you stepped on to get to where you are today.”

The company today emailed any nonqualifying people and told them that they could not be active after October 1st.

I’ve quoted from the email people got below:

“On Monday, October 1st, 2018, we’re going to completely switch our 3D printing service to the Fulfilled by 3D Hubs
offering. This means that it will no longer be possible for Hubs outside the Manufacturing Partner Program to receive
orders on 3D Hubs.

This email explains why we’ve decided to make this switch, what this means for you, and the options you have going
forward.

Why are we doing this?
3D Hubs’ mission is to make manufacturing easier and more accessible. Since we started we have produced more
than 1.7 million parts for customers through our online platform and global network of manufacturing Hubs. We’ve
noticed that as our platform has improved over the years, the customers who order most often are businesses. As we
discussed back in February in this blog post, it has become more and more essential for 3D Hubs to deliver a highly
reliable and consistent manufacturing service to our customers.

To achieve this we started building Fulfilled by 3D Hubs at the end of 2017. We tested the impact of a more controlled
and consistent manufacturing service and customer feedback has been so overwhelmingly positive, it is hard to
ignore. Since launching this service, we have seen significant growth in the usage of our 3D print service, particularly
by the professional user group. We’ve seen customer order value doubling since January. Therefore, over the past year
it has become clear that in order to best serve our growing number of professional customers, 3D Hubs has to double
down on standardisation. That’s why we are taking the hard decision to move away from our original peer-to-peer
model and become fully B2B focused.

What does this mean for you?
As of Monday, October 1st, 2018 Fulfilled by 3D Hubs will be the only option for ordering 3D Printed parts on 3D Hubs.
On this date, the following services will be discontinued:
Platform Orders to non-manufacturing partners
Embeddable Order widget orders
Individual Hub profile pages

Unfortunately, based on your 3D Hubs order history you don’t qualify to become a Manufacturing Partner. This means
that you won’t be able to run your 3D Printing service on 3D Hubs from October 1st, 2018.
If you’re not looking to run a commercial 3D printing business but still want to offer your 3D Printing services locally,
you can consider joining our Talk Maker Forum. On this new subsection of Talk, Hubs can freely connect with local
makers, hobbyists and students interested to get their projects 3D printed. While this is by no means a full blown
replacement of our peer-to-peer platform, we hope we can keep supporting makers, hobbyist and students to keep
printing locally.

It’s unclear how they want to support a peer to peer program by effectively ending it. The company has one data point it relies on, “We’ve seen customer order value doubling since January.” Since 3DHubs is not great at statistics, I could point out that across the board in 3D printing customer order values have increased dramatically over the past months since more companies are using higher value materials and also turning more and more to metal 3D printing which 3DHubs also offers. Generally, all projects of all of my clients, for example, have increased in complexity and size as 3D printing is going from something for the business development team to a business process or implementation. This is something that I’ve been tracking in a number of areas and to me seems independent of 3DHubs but just a general market development. We are maturing as an industry, and higher order values is a result of this. Simultaneously if we go from bulk PLA to all sorts of specialist models while also increasing the print volume of systems dramatically then order values will increase. It’s kind of if Mercedes would see a rise in customer spend due to perceived economic growth and decide to get rid of the A class. In this case, I think they’ve completely misinterpreted the data, and even if their conclusion was what it was, they shouldn’t have done it. They could have spent less money on the A class for example or released fewer models but killing it outright would damage their portfolio overall.

3DHubs also states, “it has become more and more essential for 3D Hubs to deliver a highly reliable and consistent manufacturing service to our customers” just at the time when desktop 3D printers are starting to equal or come close to equalling the dimensional accuracy and surface quality of some industrial systems. Just when newer more advanced desktop systems are reaching consumers, 3DHubs gives up on them? Also for certain materials such as flexible materials, desktop 3D printers outperform industrial systems both in the fit and finish of the part and the strength of the part. Part costs are lower on desktop systems as well with the material prices 30 to 10 times less per kilo. 3DHubs would have always won a price war with all service bureaus, until now. Skill levels of operators and improvements in machines have also increased the reliability and repeatability of desktop systems to the point where many more builds succeed, and more things can be printed in one build. Effectively for a year or so, 3D printing has a lower “cost” in terms of time for the desktop 3D printer operator.

Then the killer quote, “the hard decision to move away from our original peer-to-peer model and become fully B2B focused.” These two things are not mutually exclusive. Especially with higher quality 3D printed parts and more educated 3D printer users the business to business focus of the company could still be served by skilled amateurs with good machines. Or the company could have just had two service levels, well explained and kept on tucking. Now, 3DHubs has gone from a unique company with tens of thousands of people to a service bureau. It goes from having a unique value proposition of being the only company to be able to manufacture locally globally to being just another service bureau. It goes from having a unique message of being able to make efficient low carbon 3D prints everywhere on earth to be a kind of Shapeways but ten years later. Instead of growing a community now the company is going to have to out-execute Materialise and Shapeways directly. It could have won in the long run, but it would be almost impossible for them to either be higher quality than Materialise or cheaper at scale than Shapeways. They’ve gone from unique positioning, unique value proposition and unique competitive edge to a competitive no man’s land. I’ve never been more thoroughly confused by a move in business than this one. I’ll reiterate, they could have easily concluded that the future was through service bureau partners and just not have killed off the community but have kept them. This large platform of users around the world could have been incredibly valuable. No words. I can only describe this a business unforced error.

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NTU Singapore Researchers Develop Mobile 3D Printing Concrete Collaborative Robots

There’s been a lot of talk about 3D printing construction robots recently, and while we’ve seen some of these robots receive help with their task from drones, we don’t often see them working together to build structures…until now.

Large-scale 3D printing of objects, like buildings, is possible, but volume constraints and length of time can still be issues. Robot arms can be used to print anywhere within reach of the arms, and there have been some gantry systems that are able to 3D print structures, so long as the structure is smaller than it is, of course.

“The way to avoid constraints like these is to have a robot that can both 3D print things and move around, and once you’ve decided to go that route, there’s no reason not to use multiple robots to speed things along,” wrote Evan Ackerman for IEEE Spectrum.

Recently, a team of roboticists from Nanyang Technological University in Singapore (NTU Singapore) published a paper, titled “Large-scale 3D Printing by a Team of Mobile Robots,” in the Automation in Construction journal. The paper details how the researchers were able to complete the actual 3D printing, using two mobile robots operating simultaneously, of a single-piece concrete structure.

The team believes they are the first to have achieved this.

The abstract reads, “Scalability is a problem common to most existing 3D printing processes, where the size of the design is strictly constrained by the chamber volume of the 3D printer. This issue is more pronounced in the building and construction industry, where it is impractical to have printers that are larger than actual buildings. One workaround consists in printing smaller pieces, which can then be assembled on-site. This workaround generates however additional design and process complexities, as well as creates potential weaknesses at the assembly interfaces. In this paper, we propose a 3D printing system that employs multiple mobile robots printing concurrently a large, single-piece, structure. We present our system in detail, and report simulation and experimental results. To our knowledge, this is the first physical demonstration of large-scale, concurrent, 3D printing of a concrete structure by multiple mobile robots.”

These aren’t drones, but instead robot arms on mobile bases. So while there are still restrictions as to how high they can reach, they are far more flexible in terms of length and width than most other systems. Additionally, since you can bring in several cooperating robots for one big project, they are a more efficient option – one robot can tackle one problem, while a second can take on another task, and so on and so forth. Multiple robots also means that you can make stronger, more complex structures at an increased rate of speed, because, as Ackerman put it, “you don’t run into the problem of trying to bond wet concrete to dry concrete where two parts intersect.”

Because the mobile robot system developed by the NTU Singapore researchers can move around and thus define its own build volume, it can actually build structures that are essentially arbitrary in size without needing to make many system changes. You can see the system in action below:

There are all sorts of applications that a fleet of moving construction robots could work on. But the team is currently looking at one in particular, as they explain in their paper:

“Using a fleet of mobile robots for construction could have an extreme potential in other non-conventional aspects. One such application is to allow automated construction in hard-to-reach, remote areas, such as underground caves, the Moon or Mars, to which it is inconvenient or even impossible to bring other kinds of machine required for existing cementitious material printing methods.”

Currently, this system is still just an early proof of concept, so no cave construction yet. While the two robots in the video did collaborate to 3D print a structure, they’re not yet moving around during printing. Additionally, a camera array guides the robots during construction, and the existing system is not designed to be used outside…kind of a problem when you’re 3D printing a large building.

But fear not! Quang-Cuong Pham, one of the researchers, explained that it took the team several years to reach this point and that the work is not done yet, so these issues can be sorted out. Pham said that the mobile robotic 3D printing system has been “a multidisciplinary effort, combining both robotics and cementitious material formulation.”

When it comes to getting the robots to move during 3D printing, Pham explained that it will require “even higher precision in the localization of the base…to ensure that the layers are appropriately positioned one above the other.”

The team will also be working to add on-board obstacle (and human) detection to improve the autonomy of the robots, in addition to putting the robot arms on scissor lifts to increase their reach.

Co-authors of the paper are Xu Zhang, Mingyang Li, Jian Hui Lim, Yiwei Weng, Yi Wei Daniel Tay, Hung Pham, and Pham, all of whom are with NTU’s Singapore Centre for 3D Printing at the university’s School of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering.

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

[Images: Nanyang Technological University]

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TCMIP-SL A New High Resolution and High Speed 3D Printing Process

Each year in the US, about 40 million provisional teeth restorations take place, and the temporary bridges and crowns used in these procedures are necessary to protect a patient’s teeth until the permanent hardware is ready to be attached. These dental interventions aren’t cheap, but using 3D printing to manufacture the bridges and crowns can help to lower the cost.

Most permanent dental bridges and crowns are made with materials like ceramics, metals, or other strong composites, and take around two weeks to create, though this can also be reduced by using 3D printing. However, no matter which manufacturing method you use, dental patients need temporary restorations, typically made of plastic, while waiting for their permanent devices to be ready to protect their teeth and keep them from shifting around. These are either made with shells that fit the original teeth, or built from scratch with molds, and will need to be trimmed a few times in the patient’s mouth before they’re cemented. Even with the trimming, these temporary restorations can break due to daily use, and a new one must be fabricated, which just seems to me like a colossal waste of time, money, and effort.

Not to worry – digital design technologies, like 3D printing, are currently being employed to make this practice easier and less time-consuming. A group of researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) recently published a paper, titled “3D Printing Temporary Crown and Bridge by Temperature Controlled Mask Image Projection Stereolithography,” in the Procedia Manufacturing journal that discusses using an SLA 3D printing method to manufacture these temporary teeth restorations.

The schematic diagram of 3D printing a temporary crown with the TCMIP-SL process.

The abstract reads, “Traditionally, the fabrication of temporary teeth restorations must go through multiple processes such as moulding, curing and post finishing, which requires extensive expertise of dentists. In addition, the handmade temporary restorations are usually unable to precisely fit the patient’s teeth due to limited formability of material. To address the problem, a three-dimensional (3D) printing technology named temperature controlled mask image projection based stereolithography (TCMIP-SL) is presented for dental materials in this paper, with aim to build customized temporary crown and bridge quickly for its use in dental offices. We first studied the photo-polymerization performance of commercial materials that are commonly used in dental industry. Then we discussed the temperature effect on curing performance and rheology of dental composite material. Based on the studies, we further developed our TCMIP-SL process by integrating a material coating system with controllable heating, so that the coated thin film of dental composite material can be selectively cured using high resolution patterned light beam. Several test cases are performed to demonstrate the TCMIP-SL process can 3D print high viscous temporary crown material with fast speed and high resolution.”

The hardware design of the temporary crown and bridge 3D printer.

Mask image projection-based stereolithography (MIP-SL) processes use a set of horizontal planes to slice a 3D object, and each slice is converted into a 2D mask image. Then, a 2D patterned light beam, which is controlled by a digital micromirror device (DMD), is projected on the surface of a photocurable material, which is then cured layer by layer to build the 3D object – in this case, a temporary dental crown or bridge. This process is great for 3D printing macroscale model with hundreds of layers, and composite materials like multifunctional ceramic have been successfully fabricated with MIP-SL.

Unfortunately, the technology requires a special blade to achieve a thin, uniform coating of highly viscous materials, which can majorly affect the efficiency of the process.

Schematic diagram of continuous thin layer film recoating.

“Polymer based composite provisional dental materials, which provide exceptional strength, flexibility, and abrasion resistance, are widely used to fabricate temporary restorations in dental industry; however, the flowability of most dental composite materials is poor due to its high viscosity and may bring difficulty to 3D printing processes,” the researchers wrote.

Temperature can affect the viscosity of polymer-based composite materials, as the viscosity will decrease when the temperature rises.

“In the paper, we extend our previous work on the ceramic-based MIP-SL process to the temperature controlled MIP-SL,” the researchers explained in the paper.

“To optimize the process parameters, we studied the rheology of photo-curable polymer based composite material at different temperatures. Based on the result, we further investigated the curing performance of photo-curable polymer based composite materials under a large range of temperature in order to identify the appropriate temperature setting. Furthermore, a new rotary movement design was implemented in the TCMIP-SL process to continuously spread viscous composite material into uniform thin layer.”

The TCMIP-SL 3D printed temporary lateral molar shell.

The team’s TCMIP-SL technology is able to 3D print temporary dental bridges and crowns at a high resolution and speed.

“The TCMIP-SL process shows significant strength over the existing 3D provisional restoration fabrication methods that are used for dentists,” the researchers concluded. “We believe the developed TCMIP-SL process has prodigious potential and extensive foreground in variety of fields ranging from high viscous multi-functional ceramic fabrication to composite material fabrication.”

Co-authors of the paper are Xiangjia Li, Benshuai Xie, Jie Jin, Yang Chai, and Yong Chen.

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

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Scroll and Diaphragm Nozzles with Gear Pumps: A Better Way to 3D Print?

FDM 3D printing. [Image: Fraunhofer IPA]

Fused deposition modeling (FDM) 3D printing, also referred to as material extrusion, is a technique that deposits heated material through a nozzle in order to fabricate parts and components. Rollers in the extruder generate enough pressure to squeeze material into a liquefier, before it melts into a semi-liquid or liquid form and is pushed out the nozzle to solidify and form filament upon contact with either the build platform or a previously extruded layer.

You may not realize it, but the type of 3D printing nozzle you use does actually make a considerable difference in the quality of your 3D print. A group of researchers from the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering at the University of Florida recently published a paper detailing two types of nozzle that may be better for the FDM 3D printing process.

In the paper, titled “A fundamental study of parameter adjustable additive manufacturing process based on FDM process” and published in the open access MATEC Web of Conferences publication series, the researchers explain that traditionally, it’s believed that an important part of a 3D printed part’s resolution is contributed by a small cross-sectional area of each material extrusion stand. But, smaller cross-sectional filaments have slower rates of extrusion, which increases build time.

There have many attempts to fix this issue, such as applying each layer’s maximal permissive thickness or using lower support volume to target a shell-like structure. But, the researchers note that there hasn’t been a lot of adjustment to the extrusion parameters to control resolution during the FDM process.

The abstract reads, “In Fused deposition modeling (FDM) process, there has been a confliction between high productivity and high quality of products. The product resolution is proportional to the flow rate of heated material extrusion, which directly affects the build time. To reduce the build time with acceptable resolution, the idea of parameter adjustable printing process has been introduced. The controllable extruder was modified and two types of diameter changeable nozzle have been designed. This work realizes different resolution building based on the part geometry during FDM process, which can efficiently assure the quality of products and improve the productivity at the same time.”

The diameter of an FDM 3D printer’s nozzle can not only affect the material extrusion rate, but also the resolution of a 3D print. Once the resolution has been determined, its corresponding extrusion parameters can be successfully calculated to determine the relationship between the parameters and the part’s geometry.

“In this paper, the nozzle diameter was chosen as the main changeable extrusion parameter,” the researchers explain. “The extruder of the printer was modified to fit the new process, which determined the extrusion parameters under the certain resolution. The relationship between the part geometry and needed resolution was derived and two kinds of diameter changeable nozzle were designed for the process.”

Viscous fluid flows are typically metered with positive displacement gear pumps, so the researchers used one in the 3D printer’s extruder for their study.

“The speed of the nozzle movement is assumed to be the same as the material extrusion speed for a reliable resolution,” the researchers said.


An optical component called an iris diaphragm has several thin, smooth blades arranged in such a way as to form a round aperture. Due to its controllable aperture diameter, this diaphragm is often used to limit how much light is transmitted to an imaging sensor in camera shutters. That made it a good choice for a component that can change a 3D printer nozzle’s diamater.

“Compared to the traditional extrusion printing nozzle, the iris-shaped nozzle can adjust the diameter easily and realize the changeable diameter during the printing process,” the researchers explained in the paper. “The multi-blades of iris diaphragm can guarantee the circular cross-sectional shape of the nozzle. It is feasible to change the diameter of the nozzle precisely and rapidly by utilizing electronic control system.”

Geometry of scroll nozzle.

But, even if an iris shape could change a nozzle’s diameter, it may also have some gaps around the round aperture, cause leaks during material extrusion, and the high temperature could even soften the blades and lead to damaged prints. That’s why the researchers conceived of a scroll model that would work “without setting the extra planes in the nozzle.”

Inspired by paper scrolls, the circular bottom of the scroll nozzle will become smaller as the shape is rolled, though it will continue to be round. That’s why a scroll model, with its easy diameter control, may be a better choice for a 3D printer nozzle with a changeable diameter than the iris diaphragm shape.

The researchers concluded, “So far, the theoretical model for the parameter adjustable FDM process has been built up. The extruder of the printer was modified using positive displacement gear pump for controlling the flow rate by changing rotation rate so that the resolution, which is represented by filament diameter, could be adjusted by the flow rate during the extrusion process under certain optimal extrusion speed. The desired filament diameter of each building layer was determined by the part geometry using either external-slope criterion or small-feature criterion.”

A few issues to be cleared up during future studies include mechanical performances and resolution of a part’s internal sections and challenges in material selection.

Co-authors of the paper are Qia Wan, Youjian Xu, and Can Lu.

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

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Copymaster3D Unveils First Lineup of 3D Printers

Copymaster 3D is the latest new brand to venture into the world of 3D printing. The price and extensive list of features that the three new models offer, suggest that Copymaster is a name to keep an eye out for. Due to launch worldwide on the 27th August, the Copymaster 3D looks to be a compelling alternative to the likes of Creality and Wanhao in the budget-mid range sector. So what does Copymaster 3D do that makes it a great option?

High Performance & Affordable

When you are looking to buy a cheaper 3D printer, normally you have to sacrifice high performance for affordability and vice versa. The Copymaster 3D claims to be no compromise.

The Copymaster 3D is available in 3 models:

  • Copymaster 300 – (300 x 300 x 400mm) – £499 ($637)
  • Copymaster 400 – (400 x 400 x 400mm) – £599 ($764)
  • Copymaster 500 – (500 x 500 x 500mm) – £699 ($892)

The model numbers are relative to the build size of the printer, with the 500 having the largest build volume of the three. Having a bigger build size to play with immediately increases the scope of the things that you can print. Reducing that limitation makes the Copymaster so much more accessible to those who just want to print what they want.

Print Flexible As Standard

The Copymaster 3D is compatible with a wide range of different filaments as standard. The direct drive integrated extruder head can print with flexible filament straight out of the box with no additional modifications or upgrades needed.

The extruder head has also been created to be incredibly precise. Copymaster claims to have a print accuracy that is within 50 microns – thinner than a single human hair – so finished prints should be very accurate to the design files that are used.

Intricate UK Design

When you see a Copymaster 3D printer first hand, you clearly notice the thoughtful details and the nice touches throughout the design. Copymaster was designed by a small team of people who love 3D printers and actually use them on a day to day basis, at home and at work, so they knew how to make the Copymaster 3D stand out.

The Copymaster 3D is an open design, all in one unit made from industrial grade aluminum. This makes it very strong and stable when printing, which attributes to the excellent print accuracy. It is simple to assemble and only takes about 20 minutes so it’s not as daunting for beginners.

The Copymaster 3D also comes with a magnetic and flexible heated print bed as standard. It is very easy to use and has been specifically designed to take the hassle out of print removal so you can expect more consistent results for a variety of different filaments. A diamond black glass print surface upgrade is also available.

Another great feature of the Copymaster is the no-filament sensor. Running your printer for several hours only for the print to fail because you ran out of filament is probably one of the biggest frustrations you can ever experience in 3D printing. But the no-filament sensor will rescue countless 3D print jobs as it automatically pauses the printer if it detects that the filament has run out. This allows you to swap out the filament and it automatically resumes printing as normal. You’ve still lost a little bit of time, but at least you haven’t ruined your print.

“Making 3D Printing Easier and More Accessible”

The founder of Copymaster 3D and CEO of Technology Outlet, the UK’s leading online retailer for 3D printers, Tim Gray, gave a brief explanation of why he wanted to create the Copymaster 3D:

“Ultimately, I wanted to make 3D printing easier and more accessible for more people. I wanted to let people experiment with a range of different filaments without running into incompatibility issues with their printer or finding out that the print size of their printer isn’t big enough to make the project they want. After working at Technology Outlet for several years, I have seen a lot of demand and have been regularly asked for an affordable printer that offers this functionality. So I thought I’d make the solution. I’m really happy with how the Copymaster turned out.”

Copymaster 3D printers will start shipping worldwide from the 27th August and all preorders will get any two filaments for free. Also, as a celebration for the launch, Copymaster 3D is selling its first 50 pre-orders with a 20% discount, which means you could get one for as low as £399!

To find out more details and preorder a Copymaster 3D printer, visit Copymaster3D.

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Is 0.14mm the Best Layer Thickness for my FDM 3D Prints?

FDM

According to research, the most commonly-used extrusion 3D printing method is fused deposition modeling, or FDM, which is used often for 3D printing larger, stronger parts; it’s also a popular desktop 3D printing method. The technology melts filaments like ABS and PLA into liquid using the heater’s extrusion head; then, the molten materials are then extruded. The semi-fluid material solidifies within 1/10 of second into layers to build a 3D printed part.

A 3D printed object has to be able to support the weight of its own layers, and if you’re looking to make your prints more efficient, you can lower their height. Junhui Wu, with the Jiangxi Water Resource Institute’s Department of Electrical and Mechanical Engineering, wrote and published a paper, titled “Study on optimization of 3D printing parameters,” that discusses how “the influence of the parameters on the printing efficiency is derived from the analysis of the printing parameters” of an FDM 3D printer using PLA material.

The abstract reads, “With the development of 3D printing technology, the application of 3D printing has become more and more widespread, and the 3D printing efficiency problem that ensued has caused more and more researches. This paper will use the melt deposition type (FDM) forming printer. The printing consumables PLA and cylinder model were used as objects to study the effect of slice height on printing time, consumables, and dimensional accuracy and related parameters were optimized. The results showed that when the layer height was 0.14mm, the shortest printing time can be obtained on the premise of ensuring the quality of printing.”

Figure 1-1: 3D printing equipment; Figure 1-2: Testing model

A Raise3D N2 Plus 3D printer was used for this research, set with a nozzle temperature of 210°, a fill rate of 10%, and a starting print layer thickness of 2 mm; the diameter of the model is 10 mm, with a height of 15 mm.

The thickness was increased little by little for tests, and the print time was recorded with a stopwatch. Analysis of the data shows that the print speed was slower when the layer heights were smaller; on the flip side, print speed increases but the model becomes rough when the layer is thicker.

Next, the paper looks at the relationship between 3D printing supplies and layer height.

The paper reads, “According to the printing consumables required to set different floor height tests, the slicing software is used to measure the consumables of the printed products according to different floor heights.”

The results of this experiment show that when the floor height increases, so too do the consumables; however, they “have little effect.”

The last experiment the paper describes is the effect of layer height on the dimensional accuracy of the print size. This accuracy was tested at different layer heights; then, the workpiece’s dimensional error was measured from the X, Y, and Z directions with a digital caliper. The experiment showed that a print’s dimensional accuracy is higher when the layer heights are smaller. Additionally, the rate of dimensional accuracy would increase when the height did.

Figure 3-1: Layer height, printing time, consumables, and accuracy

The figure above illustrates the relationship between layer height and consumables, accuracy, and the total print time. The results of these experiments show that a layer height of 0.14 mm allows users to achieve the shortest FDM 3D printing time “under the premise of ensuring the print quality.”

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

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Researchers Build Inexpensive Open Source Bioprinter for 3D Printing Branching, Hydrogel-Based Vascular Constructs

While 3D bioprinting is not yet able to fabricate full human organs just yet, it can be used to manufacture several different kinds of human tissue, such as heart and bile duct. One of the main barriers of forming viable tissues for clinical and scientific use is the development of vasculature for engineered tissue constructs, mainly due to generating branching channels in hydrogel constructs that can later produce vessel-like structures after being seeded with endothelial cells.

But thanks to 3D bioprinting, it’s now possible to 3D print complex structures on multiple length scales within a single construct. This enables the generation of branching, interconnected vessel systems of small, vein-like microvessels and larger macrovessels, which couldn’t be done with former tissue engineering methods. However, the best sacrificial material for fabricating branching vascular conduits in constructs based in hydrogel has yet to be determined.

A team of researchers from the University of Toronto recently published a paper, titled “Generating vascular channels within hydrogel constructs using an economical open-source 3D bioprinter and thermoreversible gels,” in the Bioprinting journal. Co-authors of the paper include Ross EB Fitzsimmons, Mark S. Aquilino, Jasmine Quigley, Oleg Chebotarev, Farhang Tarlan, and Craig A. Simmons.

The abstract reads, “The advent of 3D bioprinting offers new opportunities to create complex vascular structures within engineered tissues. However, the most suitable sacrificial material for producing branching vascular conduits within hydrogel-based constructs has not yet been resolved. Here, we assess two leading contenders, gelatin and Pluronic F-127, for a number of characteristics relevant to their use as sacrificial materials (printed filament diameter and its variability, toxicity, rheological properties, and compressive moduli). To aid in our assessment and help accelerate the adoption of 3D bioprinting by the biomedical field, we custom-built an inexpensive (< $3000 CAD) 3D bioprinter. This open-source 3D printer was designed to be fabricated in a modular manner with 3D printed/laser-cut components and off-the-shelf electronics to allow for easy assembly, iterative improvements, and customization by future adopters of the design. We found Pluronic F-127 to produce filaments with higher spatial resolution, greater uniformity, and greater elastic modulus than gelatin filaments, and with low toxicity despite being a surfactant, making it particularly suitable for engineering smaller vascular conduits. Notably, the addition of hyaluronan to gelatin increased its viscosity to achieve filament resolutions and print uniformity approaching that with Pluronic F-127. Gelatin-hyaluronan was also more resistant to plastic deformation than Pluronic F-127, and therefore may be advantageous in situations in which the sacrificial material provides structural support. We expect that this work to establish an economical 3D bioprinter and assess sacrificial materials will assist the ongoing development of vascularized tissues and will help accelerate the widespread adoption 3D bioprinting to create engineered tissues.”

3D Bioprinter Hardware.

Existing 3D bioprinters have different technical advantages and deposition methods, which influence their prices and available applications. Extrusion-based 3D printers are good for tissue engineering, but the cost is usually too high for the field to experience significant growth.

For this experiment, the researchers chose to create their own open source 3D bioprinter, which costs roughly $3,000 and can be used for lower resolution applications, such as 3D printing perfusable microvessels in tissue constructs.

Printer operational overview.

Both the chosen method and material have to meet a certain number of requirements to successfully 3D print complex branching vessel systems within hydrogel constructs. First, sacrificial materials, which need to be non-toxic and maintain a uniform filament diameter during printing, have to be deposited in the desired vascular design during printing, then flushed away once the construct is done.

In addition, the 3D printer needs to have enough resolution to print all the channels – even those that will act as the small artery vessels of ~0.5–1 mm. It also needs to be able to deposit at least two materials, though more is better when it comes to creating heterogeneous tissues with different regions of varying cell and hydrogel composition.

The team investigated formulations of gelatin and PF127 due to their potential advantages as sacrificial materials in hydrogel-based tissue constructs. Gelatin, which has been used in several biomedical applications, is a thermoreversible (the property of certain substances to be reversed when exposed to heat) biopolymer of several hydrolyzed collagen segments, and can be 3D printed at ~37 °C, which is a temperature compatible with cells.

PF127 is a surfactant, meaning that it could have potential cytotoxic effects on embedded cells. But, it has inverse thermal gelation, which means it can be 3D printed at an ambient temperature, and then removed at ~4 °C to create void vascular channels.

According to the paper, “By using our custom-built printer in order to assess the printability of these materials and assessing mechanical properties, we aimed to establish which may be the best option for creating branching vascular channels within engineered tissues.”

The team’s modular 3D bioprinter includes extruding systems, 3D printed out of ABS on a MakerBot 3D printer, which were designed specifically to hold commercially-available, sterile 10 mL syringes, instead of custom-made reservoirs that would need to be specially made and repeatedly sterilized. An open-source Duet v0.6 controller board controls the system, and the print heads are isolated from the XYZ movements executed by the lower part of the chassis.

Fabricating perfusable channels.

For testing purposes, water droplets were 3D printed in a defined pattern with each extruder system, and the average distance between the droplets’ centers in the X and Y directions were measured; then, the mean distances were compared to the pre-defined CAD model distances.

“In conclusion, we found that PF127 is generally superior to gelatin as a sacrificial material for creating vascularized tissues by merit of its filament uniformity during printing and its greater compressive modulus,” the paper concluded.

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Researchers Test 3D Printed Lattice Structures as Implants to Facilitate Bone Growth

The advances being made in bioprinting and tissue engineering mean that even the most severe injuries have a chance at being repaired. Loss of bone due to injury or disease used to be a permanent condition, but that’s not the case anymore – medical technologies including 3D printing are now capable of replacing or even restoring lost bone tissue. New tissue can actually be grown from scaffolds that are implanted inside the body, as long as those scaffolds are made from osteoconductive material, which is a material that is capable of stimulating the growth of bone tissue.

A group of researchers recently conducted a study in which they used selective laser melting (SLM) 3D printing to generate titanium lattice structures as scaffolds for bone regeneration. The research is published in a paper entitled “Osteoconductive Lattice Microarchitecture for Optimized Bone Regeneration,” which you can access here.

“Bone replacement materials need to be accepted by the body and should clinically be infiltrated with bone tissue within a short time, so ideally they are osteoconductive,” the researchers explain. “Bone tissue engineering of osteoconductive biomaterials like other tissue engineering approaches normally relies on the combination of cells, bioactive factors, and biomaterial scaffold to facilitate and accelerate the regeneration of bone tissue.”

The shape of the bone scaffold can be designed to perfectly match the size and shape of the bone defect. In the study, the researchers 3D printed titanium structures to replace bone in rabbits, using SOLIDWORKS software to design the implants.

“The outer macrogeometry of the implants is designed as stepped cylinders of 7.5 mm, respectively, 6 mm diameter and a height of 4.2 mm,” the researchers state. “The inner microarchitecture is constructed by cutting out symmetrically arranged square channels in all three orthogonal directions, see Figure 1. Based on most promising scaffold parameters from the literature, the width of the channels w (distance between the rods) and the wall thickness s (rod caliber) of the remaining trusses have been systematically varied in a way that complete layers of cubic unit cells are formed along the cylindrical main axis (see Fig. 1 for an overview of the designs and Table 1 for the structural values). Finally, a 0.2 mm fine ring completes the outermost margin of the framework to close the last layer and prevent sharp edges during surgery.”

The implants were 3D printed using a Realizer 250HT from SLM Solutions. 18 adult rabbits were used in the study; they were housed in groups of two to four and each had four scaffolds applied to them at random. After four weeks, the implants were removed and studied to see how well they had stimulated bone growth, with distinctions being made between implants with different rod distance and rod caliber in a lattice titanium microarchitecture. The results showed that the best results were achieved at a rod distance of 0.8 mm and a rod caliber of 0.3 to 0.4 mm.

“Since AM and 3DP in many cases yield in a lattice microarchitecture, these results suggest to overcome the former dogma on channels of 0.3 to 0.5 mm and substitute them by channels of 0.8 mm for bone substitutes, where bone ingrowth has to occur fast and efficiently,” the researchers conclude.

Authors of the paper include Michael De Wild, Chafik Ghayor, Simon Zimmerman, Jasmine Rüegg, Flora Nicholls, Felix Schuler, Tse-Hsiang Chen, and Franz Z. Weber.

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3D Printing & the Proposed Siemens and Alstom Rail Merger

Further consolidation of the rail industry is proposed to occur with the potential merger of Siemens‘ and Alstom’s railway products businesses. Their proposed merger follows the sale of GE’s rail business to Wabtec. Siemens, headquartered in Germany, is the largest industrial manufacturing company in Europe. Alstom is a French multinational company that is operating worldwide in rail transportation industries. The merger would create a European powerhouse in the railway industry. Both of these companies utilize additive manufacturing along with their regular manufacturing methods to improve on the way components are produced.

The Research & Development Tax Credit

Enacted in 1981, the federal Research and Development (R&D) Tax Credit allows a credit of up to 13 percent of eligible spending for new and improved products and processes. Qualified research must meet the following four criteria:

  • New or improved products, processes, or software
  • Technological in nature
  • Elimination of uncertainty
  • Process of experimentation

Eligible costs include employee wages, cost of supplies, cost of testing, contract research expenses, and costs associated with developing a patent. On December 18, 2015, President Obama signed the bill making the R&D Tax Credit permanent. Beginning in 2016, the R&D credit can be used to offset Alternative Minimum tax and startup businesses can utilize the credit against $250,000 per year in payroll taxes.

Alstom

In 2015, Alstom had a conference that introduced additive manufacturing to its R&D department to help with rapid prototyping. Alstom has integrated 3D printing with prototyping various parts of a train such as the bogie; a bogie is a crucial part of a train that determines how much weight a carriage can bear. Additive manufacturing allows for the production of a single part that can replace several other parts. An example of such a part is an air vent that Alstom created by using polyamide, a flame retardant material. Alstom also likes the versatility of 3D printing; anything that can be made into a CAD model can be 3D printed from materials that range from flame retardant plastics to strong metals. Switching the materials used not only adds customization, but also serves the purpose of weight optimization. Christophe Eschenbrenner, Digital Supply Chain Manager at Alstom, introduced the idea of 3D printing spare parts to optimize time and money on a day to day basis. 3D printing spare parts solves two main challenges in the supply chain: the missing part situation; an essential piece of equipment would be missing which would lead to a train being stored in a depot, and the overstock situation, which would lead to cash being tied up as inventory builds rather than is consumed. Alstom believes that 3D printing is a rapidly advancing technology which is why they will continue to explore the integration of 3D printing into their business model.

Siemens

3D printing opens up countless new opportunities for a manufacturing giant like Siemens. Siemens already has a full facility dedicated to producing 3D printed parts located in Erlangen, Germany. Siemens realize that 3D printing allows for a quick and cost-effective way to print components that are rarely replaced. Maximilian Kunkel, head of research and development at the facility, says, “We can produce complex parts without having to worry about minimum volumes or the cost of tools.” With additive manufacturing, components can be made within days instead of waiting weeks for the delivery of the same part. Siemens had a predicament where 3D printing was quite useful; streetcar (trolley) drivers wanted switches on the driver’s seat armrest for turn signals and switching rails but it simply was not cost-effective to manufacture these new armrests due to the volume that was required. 3D printing technology solved this problem by redesigning the current armrest to accommodate the new switches and printing the requested number of armrests in a timely fashion. Siemens is working on perfecting their 3D print process by creating CAD models, improving design and materials then conducting tests on the new products. Siemens believes that 3D printing allows them to stay several steps ahead of the competition.

Conclusion

The proposed Siemens and Alstom rail merger produces new opportunities, not only in the European industry but in the 3D printing industry as well. Siemens and Alstom are both experimenting with 3D printing and its various benefits to their respective business models. 3D printing allows for the rapid prototyping of various parts and leaves room for the improvement of products already in circulation. To date, Siemens and Alstom are only using additive manufacturing on small scale components but they believe the technology will evolve to a point where 3D printing will be viable at all points in their manufacturing process.

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Charles Goulding and John Chin of R&D Tax Savers discuss the Siemens-Alstom merger.

 

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Expert Discussion Looks to the Future of 3D Printing, Supply Chain, Democratization

During the Additive Manufacturing Symposium at this week’s Science in the Age of Experience held in Boston, Dassault Systèmes brought together a well-curated group of industry experts to share a depth of experience and insights. With plenary session and breakout presentations targeting both broad and deep dives into applications and real-world adoption, attendees were treated to discussions focusing on progress and challenges as well as application-specific issues in industrial 3D printing.

L-R: Eduardo Barocio, Thomas Marchand, Andy Kalambi, John Laureto, Shawn Ehrstein, SeanMcCluskey

A panel discussion closed out the engaging Additive Manufacturing Symposium plenary session, featuring a conversation moderated by Dassault Systèmes’ Subham Sett with

Sett began the chat by asking where 3D printing is going, turning first to Kalambi for the manufacturer’s perspective.

“The first way is the easiest: take what you’re doing in subtractive and design it for additive; that’s the low-hanging fruit. The real value is in what we’re hearing in this conference: reduce complexity, change the supply chain. How do you print the parts as close as possible to the point of consumption? We’re looking at a digital supply chain, and taking additive into that, driving business model innovation,” Kalambi said, highlighting the new partnership between Rize and Azoth for indirect supply focus. “That’s where the biggest value is.”

There is great value in bringing additive manufacturing into business strategies, but barriers to adoption remain. Sett asked McCluskey for his perspective regarding these. Tracing back to a “small history lesson” in mistrust in the industry following high-profile acquisitions and failures to deliver, McCluskey noted that there are “still remnants of mistrust today” that are negatively impacting potential adoption.

“The single biggest gap, the shortcoming that will interfere with getting to these goals is that information and innovation happening is isolated; because of that mistrust, it’s being hoarded,” he explained. “We need to bridge those gaps, to bring innovation to the public space to work on the same problems with the same information. Hoarding information — and I’m using hoarding as a negative, though it’s not necessarily; look at IP — but good or bad, it’s slowing us down.”

Another barrier, Ehrstein added, comes in the form of regulation. Particularly for highly regulated industries such as aerospace and medical, parts qualification is a major hurdle to overcome.

“Getting the FAA to accept 3D printed parts on a critical structure is important. We saw Airbus, and obviously we use these parts; people want to use these parts even more. Getting those processes developed is a barrier,” he said. “In addition, we’re facing supply chain issues. If it starts getting bigger, who’s going to be out there supplying? If it starts getting bigger, will we have the supply chain to do it? And where is the workforce coming from? Where are the people who know how to design for these processes, to run the machines?”

Also highly sensitive to qualification and regulation is the medical sector, as Marchand weighed in.

“Certification is important. Looking at ISO standards, at reaching consistent quality, it’s pretty challenging,” he said. “Certifications in the medical space are as complicated as the aviation market.”

Sett kept the conversation moving amidst attendees

In addition to these barriers, discussion touched on simulation as a driver for evolution of technology and for eventual certification, as Barocio noted, in many respects representing a journey that has just started. Continuing to look forward, Sett asked about new technologies, and Kalambi touched on 3D printing as a platform with three “stacks”: hardware, software, and materials.

“For hardware, we see more and more hybridization will happen. Singular technologies are not solving all the big problems; hybridization will be the only way to solve some of these problems,” Kalambi said. “In software, there is a need for us to move forward, to digitally connect. Looking at materials, in polymers alone there are 60,000 plastics in the world. Focus has to be about innovating on the material, to mimic as wide a spectrum as possible to address possible use cases. Innovation is happening at each of these three levels.”

In the face of this “boatload of new technology coming out,” Sett asked, is the workforce keeping up? How can it? What steps ahead are necessary?

Workforce is certainly a critical issue facing the growing additive manufacturing industry, as companies and professional organizations are well aware. Education and training are imperative to upskill the workforce and prepare the next generation of engineers and designers, along with every other personnel aspect of manufacturing, for these new technologies.

“Workforce is an issue throughout engineering anyway,” Ehrstein remarked, “and on top of that with the oncoming technology of additive manufacturing as it keeps advancing faster than software can keep up with, than people can keep up with, workforce will remain an issue.

“We’re not the only school focusing on workforce; high schools are focusing on additive and growing up with additive. Everyone’s aware of additive manufacturing coming up. I have students whose first thought is, ‘I can just go print it,’ and that’s something I had to get used to thinking and other engineers had to get used to thinking. The problem is, with new technologies coming out every day, with new companies coming out with new technologies: what is the student actually learning?”

He continued, noting that the specifics of what can be done on each machine vary between technologies and between different system models. In order to meet the needs of the industry, he said, we need to find out what the industry is doing on these machines, which poses an ongoing challenge. Progams are in place, including at the WSU-affiliated NIAR, and these are constantly evolving.

All of the changes in the shape of industry impact the broader supply chain as well, Sett noted, moving the conversation forward. The main issue here, McCluskey said, comes in terms of volume. With advanced technologies come advanced materials; McCluskey used the example of polypropylene, which is commercially available at about 71 cents per pound. In contrast, he pointed to the equivalent supply of resin for a Carbon system at “more like $71 per pound,” adding that it wasn’t a perfect compoarison, but helps to get the point across. There are not, he summed up, enough tier one suppliers to supply all these materials right now.

Kalambi discussing supply chain strategy during Rize’s press conference with new partner Azoth

Kalambi additionally pointed to the supply chain issue of building in trust. While many companies are increasingly focusing on blockchain and other advanced solutions for ensuring that IP remains secure, there is certainly much more work to be done in this area. The fast-moving industrial 3D printing market requires more solutions, and needs them soon.

“Today has had a lot of bubble-popping moments,” McCluskey said. “Here’s topology optimization; it’s great, but let’s pop that bubble. A lot of these issues aren’t new — look at anisotropy. It’s the same issues. They take time, absolutely… and it’s the same problem we’ve had forever. We need to address this on a much faster time scale for this process. We have the tools to address them, it just takes time.”

To wrap up the conversation, Sett turned to a much-used term being bandied about in 3D printing: democratization.

3D printing is frequently said to be democratizing manufacturing, putting manufacturing capabilities in the hands of a broader potential user base and enabling more in terms of agility. He turned to each panelist to ask for their final thoughts on this topic. McCluskey began, looking at the issue philosophically.

“Did the internet democratize data, or did it make it harder to find the information we need?” he asked. “You can put 3D printers in everyone’s garage, but the limiting factor is still the democratization of information and how to use it. For me, the journey has been about finding the right balance — yes, there are all these holy grail things additive manufacturing offers… We need to look how to address it in the short- mid- and long-term.”

Ehrstein continued, touching on a popular misconception lingering around 3D printing.

“There’s a lot of thinking out there that you just set out your machine and press print, and boom. There are a lot of processes, there are a lot of machines, and it takes someone a year of experience before they can legitimately create consistently good parts on that machine. You have to make the investment on training, the investment on time and experience. If you’re a small company thinking about going additive, before you make that investment into these machines that can go into a million-plus dollars, I personally think you’re better off using the supply network out there first. See how the parts work, how much the parts work, before you make that investment,” he said. “There’s the thinking that when I have that machine I can just have him print that part out over there, and the truth is if you’re not running those machines every day, it takes some time before you get to that point.”

Laureto discussing powder bed metal technology during a manufacturing breakout session

Laureto picked up from there, noting that at Renishaw, they constantly deal with the cost of entry as a barrier to adoption. This is of course not limited only to initial investment, but to continuing costs of operation.

“Economic analysis is needed,” he reaffirmed. “Do all that work up front. Try to work with everyone to find that type of solution. Because not only do you buy that machine, you fill it with $60,000 worth of titanium monthly.”

Another barrier stands in the way of the typical requirements for industrial machinery, including safety equipment, proper ventilation, and the necessary physical footprint. Kalambi addressed this issue from the perspective of an industrial desktop 3D printer manufacturer known for its ease of use and environmental friendliness.

“That question is why we’re in business: to democratize, to take industrial additive manufacturing to where it has not been before. I have seen that this business has not scaled because of this question,” he said. “Working with masks and gloves limits who can go there, and this limits adoption. We have a machine that requires no venting, and can run safely on the floor here; we believe that it should be like what was mentioned here, pervasive enough that people can set up microfactories. This is where 3D printing has to go.”

Turning to the medical sector, we see that issues are a bit more specialized. Speaking to the life science point of view, Marchand noted that hospitals have a huge need, as 3D printing can be applied to synthetic organs, to prostheses, and more.

“Every hospital would like to have a 3D printing lab, and some do. The thing is, it’s painful to have a 3D printing lab. We know that because we have two, one in the US, and one in France,” he said. “We had to go to market this way, and had no one to help us this way, to manufacture up to standards all the time. We are seeing democratization of 3D printing in hospitals, but many machines right now are not very reliable, post-processing is a problem, and you need the right people. There are still many problems to tackle.”

Barocio had the final word in the discussion of democratization, and took the opportunity to offer some advice.

“My recommendation for the additive manufacturing journey is: simulation could be a heavy investment, and something in the long term will help to come up to speed faster, also lowering the costs of trials and errors,” he said. “I really recommend to use simulation, not only hardware.”

The overall tone of the discussion remained conversational, as these various perspectives came together to offer a quick picture of a fast-growing industry and technology still enduring its growing pains. The points raised offered plenty of food for thought — among many great minds in hardware, software, materials, and end-use applications set to continue driving advances apace.

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[All photos: Sarah Goehrke]