3 D Printers - A Technological Boom

Many Of you must have seen Agent Hunt (Tom Cruise) changing his identity a number of times  to ensure his victory in the mission. Well the mask which they wore is basically obtained by 3-D Printing. It is a Technology that could forge any digital design into a solid real-life product. It’s nothing new for the advanced mechanical industry, but a personal 3D printer is definitely a revolutionary idea.

How Does A 3 D Printer Works.. ???

A 3 D printer is based on a technique called Stereolithography.  Printers takes in digital input and creates solid, three-dimensional parts through an additive, layer-by-layer process. This Process is Highly Time consuming.  . 3D printers position a perforated platform just below the surface of a vat of liquid photo curable polymer. An Ultra Voilet laser beam then traces the first slice of the object on the surface of this liquid. This Hardens a very thin layer of Photopolymer. The platform is then lowered and another slice is the traced out and is thus hardened by the laser. Thus another slice is created, and the process repeats until a complete object has been printed out and can be removed from the vat of photo polymer. It is then drained of excess liquid, and cured. 
This method was invented by Charles Hull in 1984.
There are various other processes on which a 3-D Printer works such as  Fused Deposition Modelling (FDM) or Polyjet Matrix. But the method of Stereolithography is the most commonlly used method as it is highly accurate method with the the printers operating on this process has a minimum build layer thickness of only 0.06mm (0.0025 of an inch).

What are Its Advantages ???

• Complete 3D models can be manufactured including those with hollow parts that could not possibly be made by hand in one piece, even by the most skilled engineer or craftsperson. Parts such as bearings, engineering parts and complex working models can be manufactured.
• Even Complex 3 D Designs Can Be Obtained By using a 3 D Printer.
• Less time is consumed than by an skilled worker.
• Prototyping machines such as the ZPrinter 310 can even be used to produce highly accurate patterns for casting.
• It reduces the overall production cost as it eliminates the need of an special engineer to produce the same work. 
• Engineers can build true-to-life models and prototypes featuring ultra-precision details straight from the office desk.

Disadvantages of 3D Printing

Although three-dimensional printing has many advantages, it also has a few disadvantages that come with it:

• Current 3D printing materials for investment casting tend to yield sporadically rough surfaces.
• Sometimes encourages informal design methods which may cause more problems to fix.
• It may not be suitable for large sized applications.
• The user may have very high expectations about the prototype’s performance and it might fail in the exact replication of the real product or systems.
• 3-D printers are still expensive.
• Although 3-D printers have the potential of creating many jobs and opportunities, they might also put certain jobs at risk (for example, you can make your toys at home so toy stores and toy makers might go out of business).

3 D Printing Applications

3 D Printers Has a very wide application now these days. Some of them are

• Disney uses 3 D Printers forare creating something  called it “printed optics”. It enables them sensing, display, and illumination elements to be directly embedded in the body of an interactive device.Using these elements, unique display surfaces, novel illumination techniques, custom optical sensors, and robust embedded components can be digitally fabricated.

• Companies like Shapeways,Kraftwurx,and Ponoko provides 3 D Printing Services by printing their 3 D designs uploaded to there websites. The design is then shipped and charged accordingly.

•  NASA used Stratasys and itsFused Deposition Modeling (FDM) process of 3 D Printing to build parts such as flame-retardant vents and housings, camera mounts, large pod doors and many custom fixtures of a next-generation rover to support humans exploring other worlds, such as asteroids and, eventually, Mars. 

• 3 D printing technology is used in jewellery, footwear, industrial design, architecture, engineering and construction (AEC), automotive, aerospace, dental and medical industries, education, geographic information systems, civil engineering, and many other fields.

3 D Printers, have created a revolutionary change in the History of printing. And all credit goes to science. Now those days are not far behind, when every electronic item surrounding us would certainly have a special feature relating to 3rd Dimension.

A 3 D Printer in Action