Digital Wax Systems - 3D Printing

DWS was founded in Vicenza, Italy (near Venice), in 2007. Today, its goal is to streamline 3D printing (also known as additive manufacturing or stereolithography technology). Their products are currently exported to over 60 countries around the world. In Chicago, however, they were introducing the U.S. to their DFab machines. These machines are ultra-fast 3D printers that can stand chairside or on a desktop. Designed to impress, these ultra-fast machines make the manufacturing of high-quality temporary restorations possible in a single appointment.

The quality crowns and bridges these machines can produce are impressive. DWS has applied sophisticated technology it developed from other industrial applications, particularly the jewelry industry, that required sophisticated laser and light curing methods in order to preserve precious metals.

Both the chairside and desktop DFab machines are compatible with the majority of intraoral scanners and open dental CAD/CAM solutions. Look for these to make their way across the Atlantic as the price comes down and practices become honed for speed and extreme patient satisfaction.

More info: http://dwssystems.com

3D Printed Concept Car

At the Geneva Auto Show German automotive and aerospace engineering company EDAG has unveiled the Genesis, a visionary concept for the future of automotive design.

Built using 3D printing, the Genesis is a complete auto body that could ostensibly be produced by high-resolution fuse deposition modeling (FDM) machines in a single print run. At least that’s what EDAG envisions.

According to EDAG, “Unlike other technologies, FDM makes it possible for components of almost any size to be produced, as there are no pre-determined space requirements to pose any restrictions. Instead, the structures are generated by having robots apply thermoplastic materials.”

While thermoplastics might be key to reducing production costs, auto bodies are required to be strong, a fact not lost on the German firm. “By introducing endless carbon fibers during the production process, it is also possible to achieve the required strength and stiffness values.”

Although materials will deliver many of the solutions required to make the Genesis a reality, EDAG has also turned to nature to advance their automotive vision. Borrowing the geometry of a turtle’s shell the Genesis is transformed from a stiff, rigid metal sculpture to one that cushions and supports an interior carriage surrounded by reinforcing metals.

In the words of EDAG, the biomimetic concepts illustrated in the Genesis design cannot be manufactured by any means other than 3D printing. “The framework of the exhibit calls to mind a naturally developed skeletal frame, the form and structure of which should make one thing perfectly clear: these organic structures cannot be built using conventional tools! In the future, additive manufacturing could benefit designers and engineers by opening up enormous freedoms and new design options for development and production."Although EDAG’s vision for automotive design is likely a decade or more away from realization, its introduction at the manufacturer centric Geneva Motor Show represents another milestone for additive manufacturing and a clear vision for the future of safer, more economical automotive production.

3D Printers Used in School

A technology NASA will be sending into space later this year is being used by students in Middleton. Kromrey Middle School is one of few in Dane County to have 3D printers right in the classroom.

"I thought they were used by special effects crews," said 7th grader, Brandon Dunk.

So when Dunk found out he'd be using a 3D printer at school, he was thrilled.

"It's a real life object that forms right before you," said Dunk.

Dunk is part of Jeremy Dimpfl's technology class at Kromrey Middle School where two 3D printers were just introduced this year.

"It's a combination of a lot of parts," said Dunk.

He's been working on a canon he designed.

"It's very cool to see your dream being realized in a couple hours," said Dunk.

"As the 3D printer prints, it sends down layers," explained Dimpfl.

But this technology, also known as additive manufacturing, has even gone as far as creating a prosthetic hand for a 5 year old South African boy last year and will even be used in space this fall to create tools.

3D printers have been around since the 80s, but they're just now making their way into homes and schools.

"What's been cool lately companies have started making prints affordable for schools for homes," said Dimpfl.

"It's a special opportunity to have these here," said Dunk.

Dimpfl said the printers they have are between $1,500 and $2,700.

2 Areas Where Traditional Manufacturing Dominates 3-D Printing

For 3-D printing to become more competitive against traditional manufacturing, the technology has to vastly improve in terms of speed and smoothness. It can take anywhere from hours to days for a single object to be 3-D printed, putting it's at a serious disadvantage against a traditional manufacturing process like injection molding, which can easily produce thousands of parts in a day. Additionally, 3-D printing is an additive manufacturing process, meaning it produces objects in a layer by layer fashion, which can create a "stair casing" effect where you can see ridges in the finished object.

Compared to the smoothness that consumers have grown accustomed to with injection molded parts, 3-D printed parts often come off as cheap looking. In order to address the issue of smoothness, companies like Stratasys offer high resolution printers that reduces the thickness of each layer. Stratasys' recently announced full-color multi-material Objet500 Connex3 can print in layers as thin as 16 microns.

Beyond Stratasys, Hewlett-Packard has plans to enter the 3-D printing space with a printer that emphasizes speed and overall part smoothness. Earmarked for the professional service center, Hewlett-Packard hopes its competitively priced 3-D printer will attract some attention in the crowded market place.

3D Printing Market by Technology

The Market has been evolving as a technique to create 3D models and prototypes, in many industries, namely, automotive, aerospace, healthcare, and consumer products- in order to investigate the possibility of completing a project in lesser time and with few resources. However, in the last two decades, 3D printing has made a radical shift from rapid prototyping to rapid manufacturing”, mainly, because of its advantages over traditional manufacturing practices such as injection molding, CNC machining, and vacuum casting. These advantages include innovative designing, high adaptability levels, less time to market, and less tooling requirements. 3D printing manufacturing is also found to be quicker and less expensive. The ability of 3D printing to print almost any geometry with a variety of materials makes this technology a preferred choice, especially, in those markets which are characterized by high individualization, low volume, and high value; such as aerospace and healthcare. The major driving factors that support the exponential growth of the market include - the development of new and improved technologies, financial support from governments, large application areas, rapid product development at a low cost, and ease in development of custom products.

In this report, the global market is segmented on the basis of technology, material, application, and geography. The technology segment comprises of Stereo lithography (SLA), Laser Sintering, Electron Beam Melting (EBM), Fused Disposition Modeling (FDM), Laminated Object manufacturing (LOM), Three Dimensional Inkjet printing (3DP), and other proprietary technologies. The global market by material comprises polymers, metals/alloys, and others (ceramics, sand, and paper). The application segment includes aerospace industry, automotive consumer products, healthcare, government and defense, industrial/business machines, education & research, and others (arts, architecture). Health care and aerospace are the two fastest growing application areas for this market. The stringent requirements such as light weight and accurate & precise design requirements for airplanes parts are the major driving factors behind the growth of 3D printing in the aerospace industry, over traditional manufacturing methods. However, the increasing medical procedures’ volumes due to the growing population, rising income levels, low labor costs, and increasing health awareness are responsible for the tremendous growth of 3D printing in healthcare sector, as well.

The market is also categorized into four major geographic regions, namely Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and Rest of the World. Developing economies such as China and India provide tremendous growth opportunities for the market manufacturing technologies, majorly, due to the rise in lifestyle and general income levels. For instance, China is aggressively taking initiatives such as huge investment and government funding in R&D, to promote 3D printing technology as a manufacturing technique.

This report also presents a detailed overview of the overall market by enveloping all the major market segments with a detailed qualitative analysis at each and every aspect of the segmentation. All the numbers are forecast from 2013 till 2020, to give a glimpse of the possible revenue potential in this market within this period.

The competitive landscape segment in the report covers all the key growth strategies of several major players as well as startups in the global market; including 3D Systems (U.S.), Stratasys (U.S.), Renishaw (U.K.), EnvisionTEC (Germany), Optomec (U.S.), SLM Solutions (Germany), LayerWise (Belgium), ExOne (U.S.), EOS GmbH (Germany), Organovo Holdings (U.S.), and Arcam (Sweden), among others.

Scope of the report

This research report categorizes the market based on various applications, technology, materials, and geography; it also covers the revenue foretold from 2013 to 2020. It describes the demand for 3D printing technology in various regions. The report describes the applications mapping in the market with respect to the growth potential.

On the basis of the applications

It is used for various applications such as in the automotive, aerospace, consumer, healthcare, government & defense, industrial, and education and research sectors.

On the basis of the Technologies

In this research report, the market technology is segregated into Stereo lithography (SLA), Laser Sintering, Electron Beam Melting (EBM), Fused Disposition Modeling (FDM), Laminated Object manufacturing (LOM), Three Dimensional Inkjet printing (3DP), and the likes.

On the basis of the Materials

The materials used in 3D Printer are polymers, metals & alloys, powder, and others. The ‘metals’ based 3D printing technology holds the future prospect of the market.

On the basis of the geographical regions

Geographical analysis covers Americas, Europe, Asia-Pacific, and ROW. In accordance with this report, the Americas, currently, leads the market. European region is the fastest growing market, and it is believed that it will surpass Americas in the near future.

http://www.marketsandmarkets.com/

First 3D printed production vehicle to be built

Local Motors Inc., co-creator of vehicles and related components with a global community of designers, engineers, fabricators and enthusiasts, today announced that AMT - The Association For Manufacturing Technology, which supports and promotes the US manufacturing technology industry, will be the first customer for its previously announced 3D-printed production vehicle.

Local Motors will build and deliver the first direct digital manufactured vehicle at IMTS – The International Manufacturing Technology Show 2014 in Chicago, IL, on September 8-13, 2014. Designed by the company’s global community and built using the material science and advanced manufacturing techniques available at the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility (MDF) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Local Motors will produce an electric vehicle purpose-built for the urban transportation needs of Chicago.

IMTS, a large, long-running manufacturing technology trade show, is held every two years at the McCormick Place Exhibition Center. At IMTS 2012, Local Motors built its flagship Rally Fighter from the ground up in 5 days over the course of the 6-day show. This year, AMT and Local Motors have partnered to demonstrate how sustainable green technologies, utilizing advanced manufacturing techniques that are both additive and subtractive, can deliver stronger, safer, faster, more efficient vehicles.

“IMTS is the perfect venue on which to showcase the next evolution of Local Motors’ World of Vehicle Innovations,” said Local Motors CEO Jay Rogers. “To deliver the first co-created, locally relevant, 3D-printed vehicle on an international stage dedicated to celebrating cutting-edge manufacturing technology is powerful reinforcement of our commitment to driving the Third Industrial Revolution.”

“Local Motors is undeniably the first disruptive entrant into the US automotive industry in decades,” said Bonnie Gurney, director, communications for AMT. “The innovations they are driving in the design, manufacture, and sale of vehicles has been empowering individual innovators since 2007. Partnering with them to deliver safer, more functional, lightweight, and efficient vehicles via new, innovative manufacturing technologies is core to our commitment to bring global technology advancements to the local level.”

The finished vehicle will be used as an example of how sustainable green technologies can reduce life-cycle energy and greenhouse gas emissions, lower production cost, and create new products and opportunities for high paying jobs.

Element Robot a 3-D printing company is gaining popularity in Moscow

A new start-up in Moscow is making a name for itself in the 3-D printing industry by making the futuristic technology more accessible.

Reporter Rachel Dubrovin introduces us to the University of Idaho graduate that created the company, and explains why printing in 3-D is more useful than you may think.

"I think additive manufacturing is, in a lot of ways, the future," said Element Robot Inc. CEO Chris Walker. 

Element Robot is a Moscow-based start-up that's out to prove "additive manufacturing" isn't just for engineers. 

"In other words… 3-D printing," said Walker.

"For me, I think the big reason behind why I think 3-D printing is so important is that it empowers people," said Element Robot Inc. Chief technical Officer John Feusi. "It allows anyone, anywhere to create whatever they want."

"I can make one, and it'll be just as expensive per-part as if I made a thousand, and I can give it all kinds of really complex features for free," said Walker.

So this is the 3-D printer. They call it 'Tritium,' and right now it's printing an iPhone case.

"That'll take about 45 minutes to an hour," said Element Robot Sales and Marketing Director James Prado.

"I built Element Robot to give as many people as possible access to 3-D printing because right now, only a very small portion of the population can really effectively use a 3-D printer," said Walker.

"Our main business right now is 3-D print vending machines," said Prado. 

Element Robot recently installed its first vending machine on the University of Idaho campus.

"Just go online, go to our website, upload whatever you want to print, pay for it there," said Feusi.

"Click on that machine, order your print, and the machine will tell you when it's complete, and you can go pick it up," said Prado. "So you don't have to have your computer tethered to the machine, or an SD card or anything."

"We want to give every student at the university access to a great 3-D printer," said Walker.

It’s still a small business with only three employees that rent office space from a motorcycle company, but they plan to sell more printers to universities and various companies as people learn about 3-D printing capabilities. 

"For people that, you know, they had a knob on their kitchen stove break, and they can replace it," said Feusi.

"So 3-D printing has gotten to the point where you can actually manufacture goods that are useable with a 3-D printer," said Walker. "They're accurate enough, they're strong enough, they're complex enough."

"You'll continue to see 3-D printing grow, and you'll see the materials and the styles and the uses grow as well," said Feusi.

Element Robot was created in 2012. Right now, you can find one of their 3-D printers on the U of I campus, and they hope to install one at Washington State University in the near future.