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| PK:
We've really looked hard at it for hobby/work applications. We even sent a few grand to Formlabs for a Form1 at one point, only to later get the money back. Joules prints are excellent examples of what can be achieved with a "plastic puker" (apologies but it was someone else on this forum that came up with that one) printer. He clearly has a good grasp of what it takes to operate the equipment and his results reflect that, ie they all look half decent and at least good enough for fit up tests and prototypes. A business peer of mine who does a lot of mechanical prototyping and very short run production reckon's his FDM printers are fantastic. Interestingly and OT, he does something I've not seen anyone else do. He runs the printers in an box at elevated temperatures. This speeds things up and reduces shrinkage induced stress in the part. I want to make case prototypes for products and other things I can show customers. So plastic pukers are not for me. Even SLS (shapeways) needs lots of finishing before I could show it to someone and have them be impressed. We may still buy an SLA printer, but we recently sent a complex part off to a prototyping company in china for 3d printing so we could check it before we got injection mould tooling made and they said that we should get them to machine it from ABS on their 5 axis machine instead. It came back absolutely perfect. In fact, the first two units we sold were the machined prototypes because the tooling wasn't ready. So we'll probably go down the 5 axis path rather than 3d printing. |
| Will_D:
--- Quote from: Joules on January 15, 2016, 11:19:02 AM ---Will, get it drawn up as an STL, if you want shoot it over to me (PM for address) and I can check it's watertight and ready to print. Joules --- End quote --- #Many thanks for the offer Joules, but I downloaded SolidInspector^2 which claims to find the leaks and even fixes them. Also the 3d printers "tend" to verify the .stl files before printing. Any ways "new year and new technology(free-software only)" Wth: By the end of the year it will be "end of year and new hardware arriving" ( Black Friday deals on 50 micron printers :bugeye:) Tis a slippery slope us madmodders tread! And as for the digital scopes/testers/sig gens threads: "Get behind me Satan" |
| Joules:
Thanks PK, don't know if this would be of interest, maybe too small/expensive for what it is. www.pocketnc.com/ Well Will, have to find something to offer you, still hankering after trying some of your Grain father produce. :drool: |
| PK:
I've seen that little 5 axis machine before. It looks surprisingly good! I already have a 4 axis setup for my X3. It seems logical to add a trunnion table type of thing to that.... Anyhow, I promised pictures: I've done it as a link to a large JPG here http://www.caswa.com/images/forums/proto.jpg so you can zoom in and see the detail. The black part is from the injection mould tool we went on to make after we were happy with the fit of the part on the left which was machined from ABS. The finish on the ABS part is perfect... |
| PK:
:doh: Having hit the Post button I, of course, immediately find the other samples I was going to put pics up of! First one is of two technologies, on the left is a black part made by my aforementioned buddy with the preheated machines. On the right is an SLA part we had made a few years ago. You can see (I hope) that it starts to loose detail on the threads... Second is an example of what we have used 3d printing for.. The black bit was 3d printed by ShapeWays, sanded, filled, sanded, filled, sanded, sanded, sanded....... Textured. We then made an RTV silicone mold and cast the blue part in 95 shore polyurethane. The blue bit has an inductive charger for the device potted inside... |
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