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Firstly lets explain what is meant by 3D printing, well in a nut shell it is a way of fabricating objects designed on computer, for for instance if you created a mug utilizing computer aided design, within a few hours you could have the real thing sitting in front of you. It is possible to watch your very creations come to life in true Star Trek fashion, before your very eyes.
To go into more detail, currently printers are fairly slow, limited and not tremendously precise. A home 3D printer will typically set up back about ten thousand pounds, but this is cheap considering the first commercially accessible printers cost at least ten times that amount. 3D printers presently are capable of fabricating objects using silicon and certain types of metal, other substances that have been tested are plaster, play-doh and even chocolate!
Desktop 3d printing Now Available
A home 3D printer is about the size of a Microwave and connects directly to a desktop computer running software that controls its work. It then creates objects layer-by-layer by squeezing material from a mechanically-controlled squirt. Unluckily printers are somewhat limited in the sense they still generate a fairly rough end product and the time scale it takes to print an object is considerable.
Inspite of all the technical involvements, there are great possibilities for the future of 3D printing. All ground breaking technology starts somewhere, for example in the case of the PC, mainframes had existed for years, but personal computing only took off in the late seventies. A inexpensive self-assembly computer called the Altair 8800, launched in 1975, sparked the rapid development of personal computing. In similar circumstances self assembly 3D printers hope to spark the same fast development in rapid prototyping.
There are a number of different 3D printers available on the market today, all with slightly different advantages, disadvantages, characteristics and features. Some interesting projects include an open source 3D printer which has successfully been used to fabricate better parts to replace existing parts on the printer itself. The final goal of 3d printers is to perfectly replicate themselves, allowing much more cost efficient manufacturing.
The future for 3d printing solutions seems very promising, it is the fastest growing part of the rapid-prototyping industry with revenues this year expected to be approximately a billion US dollars. Many industries are showing huge amounts of interest and are seem great potential in different applications where they could utilize three dimensional printing. The US army have experimented using rapid prototyping to create parts for broken tanks, guns and other hardware in combat situations. Businesses believe a rapid prototyping machine could prove invaluable in showing factories how to assemble parts remotely, for instance in China. Even NASA has requested a high resolution machine to manufacture crucial parts in space.
In conclusion what is stopping you being part of a truly revolutionary technology, which could become one of the major breakthroughs of the twenty first century? 3D printing has merely been science fiction until recently, where it is now most certainly science fact. What can we expect to see in the not so far away future? Well one definitive goal is printable organic parts, for example replacement organs, identical skin grafts and even limbs, to combat victims of illness, disease and war.
If you want to learn more about 3D Technology, 3D printing innovative ideas and affordable 3d printing you should immediately visit our web site.
Tags: 3D, 3D Design, 3D Printing, Design, printing
Posted in Technology · January 23rd, 2010 · Comments (0)
Concurrent engineering and 3d printing technologies.
The target of competitive engineering is to have more of the participants of the design process creating value added design and development tasks at the same time in a bid to shorten the overall length of the process. A tool which can assist this process significantly is 3D printing, which enables the participators in the process to view and assess numerous design iterations quickly based on precise, durable, functional ABS parts. Thus they are able to provide valuable response, make choices and solutions and improve the design where necessary.
3D printing allows designers and developers to progress quickly from virtual part in software to physical part in hand. Within a competitive engineering process, 3D printing enables paricipators to make better informed design decisions resulting in better quality product design and create a faster product development cycle time. Both these factors are efficient in reducing costs and necessitate fewer engineering changes.
More design iterations ? faster.
So, it’s crucial to complete multiple design iterations in a highly cost-efficient manner while providing immediate response throughout the early phases of the development process. 3D printing provides the ability to quickly refine form, fit and function, which improves the design and is also key to reducing production costs and time to market. More and more companies are gaining a distinct competitive advantage by adopting 3d printing as an integral part of their design process.
Time on your side
In today’s recurrent marketplace, the typical life span of an electronic product can be just six months or even less. Mobile phones seem to be displaced within weeks of their launch. With such short product life cycles, there is growing pressure on companies to get their products to market first in order to assure success.
“A McKinsey & Co. Study suggests that a product will have lost up to 33% of its potential gross profit over its life cycle if it is late to market by just six months.”
The resulting increase in pressure that is exerted on the product design process is very high and makes critical design decisions to be committed to earlier in the process in order to be able to hit aggressive product launch deadlines. The most critical product design decisions are made at the conceptual stage or in the first 10% of the design cycle. Since these solutions typically dictate material options, manufacturing techniques, and longevity of the design they also dictate almost 80% of the product’s total cost.
With this in mind it’s easy to see the importance of making the correct decisions by evaluating different or multiple design concepts during the early design stages. 3D printing enables this by providing users with a way to quickly and effectively produce durable, functional ABS parts that provide accurate feedback of the status of the design.
If you want to learn more about 3D Technology, 3D printing innovative ideas and 3d printing art you should immediately visit our web site.
Tags: 3D, 3D Design, 3D Printing, Design, printing
Posted in Technology · January 19th, 2010 · Comments (0)