The 3D printing technology made its way to the technological world in the year 1986. But, only in 1990’s, it became fast and effective. And in recent times, the 3D printers with high efficiency have been made available in the market at low costs. Here’s a brief overview of 3D Printing Technology.
It comes under rapid prototyping systems, and the 3D printing has an inkjet printing system also. This technology is preferable since it promotes full color for prototypes.
The 3D object is created through a layer by layer process. A fine powder that consists of plaster, corn starch and resins are used to build layers. The layers are bonded by an adhesive from the inkjet print head which is called as printing. The shape of each cross-section of the object is determined by a CAD file. The strength of these prints can be increased by thermo-set polymer impregnation or wax.
Some printers use a liquid named photopolymer for the formation of each layer. This photopolymer layers are cured by using an Ultraviolet (UV) lamp that is attached to the inkjet printer.
There is also a method called Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) in which a nozzle deposits molten polymer into a mould layer by layer. The strength of these objects can be increased by inserting another metal into it.
The joining of cut thin layers of exact shapes gives the laminated finishing. Each technology has its own merits and demerits. However the main factors to be considered are speed of finishing, cost of the object and the printer, materials used (powder or polymer), color capabilities and so on.
These are used in architecture, organ printing, metal casting, education and many other fields.
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