and a 3D Model is worth a thousand pictures! Nanofabrica releases details of industrial parts produced on its Tera 250 micro additive manufacturing (AM) system
Micro 3D printing technology innovator Nanofabrica is delighted to release some information about recently produced parts that illustrate the exceptional precision and tolerances that can be achieved through the use of its Tera 250 AM system.
Existing at the interface of 3D printing for production and the industry-wide drive towards miniaturization, Nanofabrica’s industrial next-generation micro 3D printing technology lifts the lid for designers and manufacturers in their quest to embrace the inherent advantage of the technology, and enables them to exploit the ability that exists through 3D printing to build complex parts in small, medium, and high volumes in a timely and cost-effective fashion.
The technology is based around a Digital Light Processor (DLP) engine, but to achieve repeatable micron levels of resolution combines DLP with the use of adaptive optics. This tool in conjunction with an array of sensors, allows for a closed feedback loop, the reason that Nanofabrica’s Tera 250 can achieve very high accuracy while remaining cost-effective as a manufacturing solution. In addition, through rigorous R&D, Nanofabrica has managed to develop its own proprietary materials (based on the most commonly used industry polymers) which enable ultra-high resolution in parts built.
IMPELLER
The first part is an industrial impeller which is used to increase the pressure and flow rate of a fluid measuring X 5.66 mm, Y 5.66 mm, and Z 2.87 mm. The advantages of using Nanofabrica’s Tera 250 additive manufacturing machine to make this part is that short-series runs can be undertaken economically, and the technology facilitates exacting geometric complexity inherent in the micro part design. The impeller is manufactured for use in industrial MEMS and micro mechanical mechanisms, and through the use of the Tera 250, it is easily customizable, and can be produced quickly and economically without the necessity for complex, costly, and difficult to amend micro tooling.
The part is characterised by complex curves and super sharp edges that would be difficult and costly to produce using conventional molding technologies. Using the Tera 250, product development costs and production time is dramatically reduced, and the 50 mm x 50 mm x 100 mm build chamber allows for the production of high numbers of customized parts per build.
An industrial impeller produced on the Nanofabrica Tera 250
FIBER OPTIC ADAPTER
The next part is a fiber optic adapter which has complicated internal curved cavities/canals used for feeding optical fibers which are easily produced through the use of the Tera 250 machine but would be extremely difficult and expensive through the use of conventional micro tooling and micro molding. With the Tera 250, these highly precise parts can be produced to exacting tolerances, and the machine is ideally suited to short series runs. The channels in the adapter need to accurately accommodate 250 micron fiber optics, and the overall part dimensions are X 9.0 mm, Y 6.0 mm, and Z 6.0 mm.
Avi Cohen, EVP Global Sales at Nanofabrica comments, “We are delighted to be able to release details of some of the successes we have had using our 3D printing technology. It is only through the unique combination of hardware, software, and material innovations at Nanofabrica that we can claim that the Tera 250 is the first 3D printing machine to not just be able to achieve such precision and accuracy, but to be able to do so while at the same time being commercially viable in terms of speed of production and cost of production. The Tera 250 is now proven to be a game changer when it comes to opening up the advantages of 3D printing to the micro manufacturing world for the very first time. Design engineers and OEMs can now see that restrictions that they have to work within when designing and manufacturing for traditional manufacturing processes are no longer there. As such the Tera 250 and the use of 3D printing for micro manufacturing will be the spur to innovation and increasingly cost effective, speedily produced mass customizable micro parts and components into the future.”
