Superman From 3D Printing

Superman From 3D Printing
Superman From 3D Printing

Video: Superman From 3D Printing

Video: Superman From 3D Printing
Video: The Flash and Superman - 3D Printed Justice League Part 1 2024, March
Anonim

I always lacked a "third eye" in order to imagine some detail of a mechanism or a house from drawings - and even more so, I do not know how to do this if you need to clearly see the whole on the basis of several drawings. For me, drawings are the same as for most non-musicians sheet music: no matter how much you look in a sheet music book, you will not hear the music.

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Computers, of course, have become the cure for this kind of "disability" in recent decades. In any case, sometimes the technique does the job. Now, for example, no one will be surprised that a computer will play music from notes and even replace an orchestra. With drawings, it is true, it is more difficult, but even here there are software products that will help in creating a three-dimensional computer model. Finally, three-dimensional printing appeared, which can quickly make a computer model a very real thing that can be touched, examined from all sides and used for practical purposes.

Printing in three dimensions

Three-dimensional printers, of course, still do not build houses: so far, the fiefdom of such devices is prototyping. Small objects can be built at life size, and larger ones at a reduced scale. Each of us has seen desktop models of human organs, spacecraft, cars, buildings, or even urban areas - much of this has been printed in whole or in part by a 3D printer.

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Although this technology has been around for over a decade, it is still out of sight. The fact is that a 3D printer is not a household item, but special equipment. The same companies for whom prototyping is a mandatory step in any process have long appreciated the convenience of 3D printing. Including because not everyone who determines the fate of this or that project gets the imagination to see volume and integrity in the drawings. You will waste your time poking at the blueprints and explaining to the master of financial flows exactly what the new shopping center will be like. If I were in the place of the master, I would certainly have pushed aside the drawings, computer visualization and asked: "Well, how will it all look in reality?" Here would be a good time to bring the "business tycoon" to the layout.

You can, of course, according to the good old tradition, go to a model workshop, where with the hands of ten or more people, a model at the required scale will be created in a week (or maybe a month) from cardboard, paper and other materials. However, this is a long process, and the costs for it will not always be justified. What if you need to change something in the layout? Then all the work and the money invested in it will be wasted: the rework will take the same amount of time, and the customer will have to pay for the work again. Of course, it is too early to write off professional model workshops, there are situations when they are irreplaceable, however, thanks to a three-dimensional printer, a model or its individual parts can be redone in just a day, changing the shape, color or size. It is convenient, visual and fast. You don't have to look for anything on the side, you don't need to wait a week for the order to be completed: if a 3D printer is in your office, you make changes to the computer model with a few clicks of the mouse and send it to print.

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The example of an architectural project I have given is quite real, but it is far from the only one possible. The 3D printer will be appreciated by industrial and graphic designers, medical professionals and even cartographers. Such a device will be useful in factories, research institutes and souvenir factories. Elmira Gafurova, director of work with partners at Etorg, said that their ZPrinter 650 is capable of, if not everything, then a lot. “I really enjoy talking about the machine and 3D printing technology. I know how exciting all this is, - says Elmira. - And the capabilities of the printer are simply amazing. Perhaps no other technology is capable of creating similar models for commensurate money. " A close acquaintance with a 3D printer began for Elmira when Etorg decided to sell such devices. Of course, future customers cannot be left alone with unfamiliar technology, and in order to master the 3D printer themselves, the company bought one of these devices for its own needs. Elmira, as the leader of this project, had a hard time at first: she mastered the work on the printer on her own. “Although I am familiar with technology, it was not very easy without qualified help and special knowledge,” recalls Elmira. - Thanks to the owners of a similar printer - colleagues from the St. Petersburg company "Invent", who helped me to cope with this. " Now Elmira herself is ready to come to clients for free, tell and show: she is sure that no seller will tell more about the technique than the person who uses it. Having accepted Elmira Gafurova's invitation, I came to the Etorg office, where the ZPrinter 650 stands, to hear a detailed story about the technology and the apparatus. I must admit that the trip turned out to be extremely informative and interesting.

Soon after the inspection of the apparatus and Elmira's explanations about what and how it works, I realized why each of us still hadn’t bought a similar thing home to print for fun for the sake of printing little toys for our children, some figurines for collections, or even replacement for a lost keychain. The ZPrinter 650 does all this with ease, but it's a fairly large machine (1880 x 740 x 1450 cm), and the difference between it and a typical home device is about the same as between your inkjet printer and a mini photo lab. But for the office, this technique is quite suitable: it prints almost silently, and with proper precautions, there is very little dirt. The mention of cleanliness is no coincidence, since Z Corporation's technology is based on the layer-by-layer growth of a product from gypsum powder, which, in theory, could be found everywhere around the printer used. I could, but it doesn't. Growing takes place in a closed chamber, and excess powder is removed with a vacuum cleaner built into the printer.

How does printing work?

The construction chamber has dimensions of 254x381x203 mm, which determines the maximum size of the product. Anything that is several times smaller, you can print several pieces at once in one session. Anything larger than the camera size has to be split into parts that can be printed separately. At the end, the individual parts are assembled into a single whole. The printing process starts at the top of the camera. The lifting platform, which forms the lower wall of the chamber, first rises upward, its surface is covered with a thin even layer of gypsum. The print head, which is similar in structure to the head of an inkjet printer, applies a special adhesive liquid to those areas of the surface that should form the bottom layer of the product. The liquid solidifies almost immediately, gluing the powder together in the right places. Then the lower platform is lowered slightly, a new layer of powder is applied, and the printing continues. The powder that is not included in the product itself, gradually filling the entire space of the chamber, supports the grown model, which is why they can be printed in whole lots if there is enough space in the chamber. It is enough to provide minimum gaps between them: tightly walled in powder throughout the entire printing session, the products do not move and "grow" without interfering with each other. In the process of building a product, its future surface is painted: the ZPrinter 650 supports 24-bit color using four printheads (CMYK). Color in conventional printing doesn't surprise anyone, not even a home user, but 3D printing doesn't have such a rosy relationship with color. Some approaches to three-dimensional printing, implemented in the machines of other companies, allow you to make models in different colors, but at the same time leave them in one color. For example, competitors will not be able to print a figurine of a white boat with a blue sail: it will be necessary to make the blue and white details separately, providing for the possibility of combining them into one composition. Apparatus Z Corporation really knows how to simultaneously paint a product in different colors according to your desire. The resolution of the ZPrinter 650 is 600x540 dpi. It prints at a speed of 28 mm per hour, and the thickness of one layer is about 0.1 mm. The original computer model is automatically divided into layers of this thickness by the print driver even before the start of the process.

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At the end of the process, the entire chamber is filled with gypsum powder, inside which there are one or several items. Most of the unused powder can be automatically removed from the chamber by the printer itself for reuse, after which the products are dried for an hour and a half at a certain temperature. The last stage is the impregnation of the product. The model is dipped in special glue (sometimes it is more convenient to apply it with a brush). The purpose of this procedure is to make the product durable. Before impregnation, even though hard gypsum products are extremely fragile, and after that even a thin part is extremely difficult to break with your hands. However, depending on the purpose, different impregnation compositions can give the finished products different strengths.

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The subtleties of plaster science

Elmira Gafurova said that in many respects the usability of the printer depends on the initial model: “If the computer model is initially ready for printing, then it takes only about half an hour to prepare the device. If the model needs to be modified, the preparation can take hours. But this has nothing to do with printing directly: everything rests on the qualifications of the designer who made the original model on the computer, and on how many errors have to be corrected. Most often, it is required to increase the wall thickness - especially in models that have cavities.

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One of the most difficult tasks for Elmira and her colleagues was to create a model of the stadium. The stadium consisted of several parts, which were then assembled together. Such a model should not fall apart under its own weight; its design should be carefully thought out in advance. “We brought the roof to the desired state, providing for stiffening ribs, but forgot about the bottom a little,” recalls Elmira. - There were very delicate parts that were deformed and destroyed during post-processing. Fortunately, only one detail had to be reprinted. Models like these, which are large in themselves, but abound in small details, are very difficult to process with reinforcing glue. It is on such tasks that the flaws of the original computer modeling are most often manifested.

Etorg's experience shows that the larger the camera volume is occupied by the model, the more profitable it is to print it. It's not about the price of gypsum powder, but about the cost of the paint. “But with the help of the ZPrinter 650,” says Elmira Gafurova, “you can make many models at once, distributing them into several“floors”over the entire area of the chamber.” Unfortunately, it is not always possible to achieve this optimality. It is hoped that in the future the technology will be more in demand and there will be no end to those who want to get a prototype, but so far a 3D printer is such a device that is not at all suitable for those who occasionally need to print a single model the size of a tennis ball. Perhaps, in this case, a company working on a different technology will find its client … Like any equipment, the ZPrinter 650 has its own recommended load, and this should be taken into account when planning the purchase of any professional equipment in order to make money on it. “3D printing is expensive,” says Elmira. - There is no question of any profit of a thousand percent. There are models, the profit from which comes out at all zero: we simply do not raise prices above a certain level."

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It should be noted, however, that alternative technologies for the piece-production of a prototype of this or that product are also expensive, but at the same time take much more time. That is why the Etorg company is now receiving a lot of third-party orders for the manufacture of such products - 3D printing is more convenient and faster. Although there are other manufacturers, Etorg only offers printers from Z Corporation. My interlocutor and her company made their choice quite deliberately, because the available alternative is one-color printing, which, moreover, is five times slower and almost an order of magnitude more expensive. So from a certain point of view, the high cost of 3D printing with the ZPrinter 650 turns out to be relatively modest.

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However, as long as the absolute costs of 3D printing are significant, your own project will be a good help in the return on investment of a 3D printer. “We are currently working on filling the online catalog with 3D models that can be selected and printed,” says Elmira. - A 10 cm superman figurine when ordering from us will cost you about 1600 rubles. This is a lot. At the same time, if someone needs to implement an idea that requires the transformation of a three-dimensional computer model into a completely tangible thing, this is an affordable amount. Elmira Gafurova believes that 3D printing has good prospects in Russia. Perhaps the boom will not come with the current prices for equipment and consumables, because they also depend on the degree of prevalence of technology. Popularity depends on the opportunities provided by technology. They are obviously large and far from being exhausted, just as the possibilities for improving 3D printing itself are not yet exhausted.

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