If pre-production parts are to be manufactured effectively and at a low cost from the original material, 3D-printed injection moulds are very well suited since the material properties of the parts made from the 3D print mould and the later volume parts from a conventional serial mould are very similar. Even though plain bearing materials […]
Additive manufacturing describes a disruptive production process in whichmaterial is applied layer by layer additively to create a physicalcomponent. The basis of the layered structure are3D CAD design data. Components are built layer by layer instead of beingsubtractively machined from a bar stock (e.g., milled, turned). Theproduction process differs fundamentally from theconservative machining fabrication methods […]
The inventor of the 3D printer is the American Chuck Hull, who patented his invention in 1986 (US4575330) and founded the company 3D-Systems. However, it should be noted that the actual discoverer of the procedure was another person. Hideo Kodama could not register the patent in time because of a formal defect and Chuck Hull […]
For processing in 3D printing, an appropriate STL file must be available. This can either be created directly in a CAD programme or converted from an existing CAD file. However, the conversion from STP to STL data may result in inaccuracies in the hundredths range. This is due to the different types of surface mapping. The […]
SLA (stereolithography): ± 0.2 % (with a lower limit of ± 0.2 mm) The stereolithography (SLA including DLP), together with Polyjet, is the most accurate method. The diameter of the laser is usually between 100 and 150 µm. This is much less compared to the FDM method. This results in fewer tolerances and the […]