Drone Customization With 3D Printing
a reprint from https://www.lubrizol.com/ Breakthrough TPU enables innovator to better serve hobbyists In the world of manufacturing, it’s often difficult to make the numbers work when serving a niche market. When your market is a niche of a niche, the challenge becomes even greater. Yet, R3D Shifters is doing just that, successfully catering to the hobbyist sector of the non-commercial drone market. “These aren’t the people who run out and buy a drone right off the shelf,” explains Netanel Bellaishe, company co-founder and lead designer. “These are the folks who want to essentially build their own drone.” To help them do that, R3D Shifters designs and manufactures chassis and parts customers can complete with their own motors, control boards and other largely standardized components. To serve this narrow market efficiently, R3D Shifters relies on MJF 3D printing on the 4200 and the capabilities of the latest TPU (thermoplastic polyurethane) technology. Business could not have taken off with injection molding It would be possible to make many of R3D Shifters’ products with injection-molded plastic, but with nowhere near the efficiency necessary to be viable. “Simply creating a mold might cost between $50K to $100K, which would require running thousands and thousands of parts to [...]
Mastercam Add Solid History Function
Let’s take a look at how to use the Mastercam Add History function. Suppose you receive a complex solid model from a customer and before you can start machining it you need to address some part revisions. In our example below, we have a fit counterbore that needs to be changed from 34mm to 1.375” diameter to match the new mating part. After we identified the proper hole and analyzed it to confirm the current diameter of 34 mm we opened up the Solids Manager to find there was no model history, but rather just a single solid body. Without model history, you cannot edit specific features. This is where the Add History function becomes handy. To start using it, open the Model Prep tab and select the Add History function. Now you can select Hole Operations as the features you want Add History to find. You should also set a maximum radius larger than anything you would expect to see on the part to ensure all holes are accounted for. Once we click the green check, Mastercam scans the solid body for possible solid holes and generates them as individual operations in the Solid Manager. When the operation is complete, you will [...]
Selecting Your Company’s First 3D Scanner
by Harry Foxman - a reprint from https://www.fabbaloo.com/news/lessons-from-cimquests-2021-xpand3d-event-part-one What to look for in selecting a 3D Scanner Over the past three decades, scanning technology has advanced immensely. It is now a helpful tool to be used in reverse engineering, inspection, and 3D printing. With a large number of different types of scanners from a variety of manufacturers on the market today, it is important that a company selects the correct one. Before beginning the search for a scanner, companies should have predetermined criteria mapped out. In order to narrow down the vast field of scanners on the market, there are several different steps to consider guiding you in the right direction. The first step is to determine what sizes of parts you want to scan. Are the parts large or small, mechanical or organic? For example, scanning a part to be used in a machine would require a drastically different scanner than scanning a feature on a body. The application of what is scanned also needs to be considered. An item can be scanned for a variety of reasons including reverse engineering, metrology, 3D printing, web content, and virtual reality. Additional software processing costs are also something that needs to be considered as [...]
Desktop Metal Qualifies 4140 Low-Alloy Steel for High-Volume Additive Manufacturing
The First Company to Qualify 4140 via Metal Binder Jetting for the Mass Production of Strong Steel Parts That Withstand High Impacts, Temperatures and Mechanical Stresses Desktop Metal, a leader in mass production additive manufacturing (AM) solutions, today announced it has qualified the use of 4140 low-alloy steel for the Production SystemTM platform, which leverages patent-pending Single Pass JettingTM (SPJ) technology designed to achieve the fastest build speeds in the metal additive manufacturing industry. Desktop Metal is the first and only company to qualify 4140 low-alloy steel for use with metal binder jetting systems, enabling its use in mass production end-use part applications. Desktop Metal is the first and only company to qualify 4140 low-alloy steel for use with metal binder jetting systems, enabling its use in mass production end-use part applications. This linear pneumatic piston is used to convert air pressure into rotary motion through a rack and pinion with 4140 providing the toughness and wear resistance required for this application. (Photo: Business Wire) Considered one of the most versatile low-alloy steels, 4140 is characterized by its toughness, high tensile strength, and abrasion and impact resistance. It is a critical all-purpose and heat-treatable steel used extensively in a variety of [...]
How to Prepare for the Release of Mastercam 2022
The only thing worse than a useless tool is an excellent tool that goes underutilized. When you invest in a powerful computer-aided manufacturing system to bring your shop to the next level, make sure you are getting absolutely all you can out of it. Part of this comes down to preparation. Use this checklist to prepare for Mastercam 2022 and to unlock untapped potential sitting in your shop. 1. Organize Your Tools The first step to tool organization is tool optimization. Are you using the same 10 end mills for 90 percent of your projects just to keep things simple? Are you relying on adequate tooling instead of optimized tooling? Take this time to look critically at the end mills you use, the end mills you leave in the drawer, and the end mills you might need to buy. Selecting the best tool for a project can not only reduce cycle time but can also reduce excess tool wear and gouging. Once you have reevaluated the tools your shop needs, consider tool organization, both physical and digital. Physically, the most used tools should be easily accessible and clearly organized. It won’t matter how efficient your programming is if your machinists are wasting time [...]
Organic 3D Modeling with Freeform
In this post, we’ll take a look at Geomagic Freeform, an organic 3D design software. Freeform offers a sculpting and design toolset to sculpt, detail and deform virtual models into any form you desire. In this example, we’ll focus on Sub D Modeling. This Technique is used to create detailed modeling from a polygon mesh framework. Through Sub D modeling, you’re not modeling the actual surface or solid, you’re shaping the solid by manipulating the surrounding Control Cage. In this example, we have a 6 faced cube. Our underlying surface has 6 faces as does our Control Cage. If we take the surface model and click level 2, it divides each face into four faces and averages the positions with all the adjacent faces. We’re left with a new surface model, with 24 faces. At the next level, we quadruple to 96 faces. And as we go to level 5 and even 6, the faces get smaller and smaller until we get to the point where our model looks like a sphere. By increasing the numbers of faces, we can create very fine details in certain areas and have very coarse details in other areas. Now let’s take a look at the Control [...]