Formlabs Fuse Series 3D Printers Records Fastest Print Time Ever
Not Only Did the Fuse Series 3D Printers Record the Fastest Print Times But SLA Reaches New Heights Formlabs’ most recent software update, PreForm 3.34.0, introduces several features that can unlock new printing capabilities for both stereolithography (SLA) and selective laser sintering (SLS) workflows. With these updates, the Fuse 1+ 30W makes fast, daily production of full builds possible — print speeds are 25% faster than with previous software, and over three times as fast as original Fuse 1 print times. Now, 95% of fully packed Nylon 12 Powder print jobs will be completed in less than 14 hours, and typical builds will finish in just seven hours. In addition to the 25% speed improvement for the Fuse Series, new build volume parameters for the Form 3 Series increase available height by 4% for desktop and 7% for benchtop SLA, and new workflow updates demonstrate our commitment to continuous improvement for both our powder and resin printing ecosystems. Constant iteration is not just something that 3D printing enables for our customers, but something that we know is necessary for any successful product, including our own. By listening to and incorporating feedback, Formlabs is working to ensure that our printers are powerful, reliable tools [...]
Mastercam Announces the Signing of an Agreement to Acquire Cimquest
I’m excited to announce that Mastercam, in conjunction with Sandvik, has announced the signing of an agreement to acquire Cimquest. This is a natural next step for our Cimquest organization to allow us to expand our technology and support to become more accessible to Mastercam users in the Northeast region of the United States. It is important to note that there are no plans to change relationships with any of our external vendors, customers, or support solutions as a result of this acquisition. We will continue to offer our premier technology and support to our customers. I will be the Vice President, of Integrations and Owned Entities at Mastercam, and Shawn Crews will be the Managing Director of Cimquest. Shawn will act as the liaison between Cimquest and Mastercam; he will also ensure continuity of services and operations for our customers throughout the transition and beyond. Cimquest adds talent, operational efficiency, and diverse perspectives to Mastercam’s ecosystem of solutions. The acquisition allows Cimquest to focus on what we do best: serve our customers! More details on the announcement of the signing of the acquisition’s press release can be found here (Sandvik Announcement). In closing, we are grateful to be part of this fantastic [...]
Understanding Mastercam Multi-Threading
This blog post will cover Mastercam Multi-threading and how it can accelerate your toolpath creation. To understand multithreading, we first must know what a processor is and how that processor uses cores and threads. The processor is what carries out the individual tasks assigned by the application. Early computers only could only process one instruction at a time, because they had one core. Now, processors can have multiple cores and each core can carry out individual tasks. The more cores you have, the more tasks your computer can perform simultaneously. Cores can have multiple threads thereby multiplying the ability of your processor to carry out tasks by the number of threads it can process. So how does this affect you when using Mastercam? Prior to Mastercam 2024, you couldn’t utilize multi-threading capabilities. This meant that whenever you completed or regenerated a toolpath you were unable to make another toolpath until that path had completed generation. Now with multithreading, Mastercam divides the workload between your cores, sending tasks to those cores via threads and allowing you to continue programming. To illustrate how this works we will look at the toolpaths in Mastercam that can utilize multi-threading. Then we will determine how many cores our [...]
Working With the Mastercam Analyze Entity Tool
Mastercam has multiple tools for measuring and gathering information from your geometry. Some of these tools also include additional functions like the Mastercam Analyze Entity tool. This article will explore how to use this tool. You can access the Analyze Entity utility by selecting Home/Analyze/Utility from the main menu. Alternatively, you can also launch it from the right-click menu, or use the F4 key to launch it at any time. After selecting the entities, you are given most of the information that you would normally expect to see. For Circles, you will see the diameter and the center point location. For Lines, you will see the length and the positions of the endpoints. One thing you can do with Analyze Entity is make changes to the entities themselves. You can reposition the circles, change the diameter, and even change the arc sweep. For Lines, you can change the length, flip point 1 and point 2, and also reselect the points used to create the line. There is a useful feature to assist in editing multiple arcs at once. If you select one arc and hit F4 while Analyze Entity is open, you can select the next arc you want to look at. You [...]
Working With the Shining 3D FreeScan UE Pro
Today we are going to talk about working with the FreeScan UE Pro laser handheld 3D scanner, brought to you by Shining 3D. Just as CNC machine tool and 3D printer manufacturers design products to address different part sizes, materials, etc. scanners are no different. It takes the expert staff we have at Cimquest to offer guidance and direction for users tasked with choosing the scanning solution that best fits their metrology and reverse engineering requirements. The FreeScan UE Pro is a high-precision, metrology-grade laser scanner. While providing an incredible capability for fine-feature scanning using its 5-laser line mode, it also improves the global position control for large-scale, workpiece scanning by deploying built-in photogrammetry. Among the many excellent characteristics, the UE Pro can scan normal, reflective, and even black parts and can do so all within the same scanning project. Therefore, for parts of varying size details and made up of varying textures (shiny metal, black tubes, etc.), the UE Pro is an excellent selection as it can adapt quickly to these different scanning requirements and challenges. There are three laser controls. The main scanning environment utilizes 26 crossing lasers for getting through large scanning projects very quickly. The 5 parallel laser line [...]
Training Classes – CimCast
Training Classes In our second episode of CimCast, we discuss the Mastercam training classes that Cimquest offers. If you have podcast topic ideas, please send them to cimcast@cimquest-inc.com.