I thought this article would be of interest to the 3D FAB people, if it wasn’t on your radar already. The technology is too far out of my understanding, but I couldn’t believe the speeds of this thing.
Carbon3D Unveils Breakthrough CLIP 3D Printing Technology, 25-100X Faster
Here’s another article, with more details:
“DeSimone and colleagues created a resin chamber that has a windowpane on the bottom. The windowpane lets in UV light and also oxygen, much like new contact lenses. So the bottom layer of the resin pool is full of oxygen and no polymerization can happen there, regardless of UV light exposure. Scientists refer to this region as the “dead zone.” UV light shot up through the window, however, can reach a sweet spot further into the resin, past the dead zone.”
“the structures could form quickly, some as fast as 500 millimeters per hour, the authors report. Typical 3-D printer speeds are just several millimeters per hour.”
“New method leaves older ways of 3-D printing in its goopy wake”
My quick and simple understanding. Instead of traditional electro-mechanical methods it uses light and chemicals to form the plastic.
Stereolithographic printing uses light and chemicals to produce solid objects. It’s actually the first type of additive 3D printing invented, back in 1985. Carbon3D has modified the process a bit, by using oxygen to inhibit the formation of solid polymer while charging the entire vat of chemicals with UV light. I don’t know exactly why that is faster than the regular method, but I’m guessing it’s because it energizes the chemicals, so they will be ready to polymerize immediately when the oxygen level drops.
The hardening of UV curable resin is dependant on the amount of UV light adsorbed by preventing the majority of the resivor from hardening the Carbon3D can apply more UV light to the next layer of the print. More UV power = Less time per layer = less print time.