SBIR Phase I: High Speed Electrophotographic 3D Printing System

这个小型企业创新研究(SBIR)第一阶段项目的更广泛的影响/商业潜力是，它将推动添加剂制造进入定制的医疗保健产品，减少对制造的环境影响，并提高供应链实施的效率。这将反过来为独特的小批量零件创造更低的成本，从而降低这些关键领域的总成本。目前，非常慢的打印速度是3D打印过程普遍关注的问题。通过大幅加快3D过程并减少废品量，3D打印的成本与塑料注射成型的成本相等的经济盈亏平衡点可以用更少的部件实现。预计系统成本也将与目前3D系统的系统成本相似或更低，而材料成本与目前的方法相当，因为使用了非常相似的粉末热塑性材料。这种创新技术可以实现极高的处理速度，再加上这种方法适用于全色热塑性材料，这使得它成为添加剂制造的潜在游戏规则改变者。该项目使用办公室激光打印机中的技术。这项技术以前从未被用于快速成型系统。以前也有过利用激光打印技术的尝试，但他们都发现很难制造出厚度超过四分之一英寸的零件。该项目是该技术应用方面的一项根本性创新，因为它分离了转让和合并这两个关键功能，这两个功能在以前使用该技术的尝试中一直是结合在一起的。这一创新使这两种功能都得到了更好的控制，通过使工艺看起来更像激光打印机中使用的那样，解决了制造更厚部件的问题。这项创新还允许3D打印零件的速度比任何现有方法都快五倍。预期的技术成果是快速、均匀地逐层建造多层材料块。该流程还包括在构建过程中支持部件的能力。这是通过使用第二激光打印机引擎来实现的，该引擎创建与构建层图像一起传送的支持粉末的图像。零件制造完成后，支撑层即可溶解。

The broader impact/commercial potential of this Small business Innovation Research (SBIR) Phase I project is that it will propel additive manufacturing into customized healthcare products, reduce environmental impact for manufacturing, and increase efficiency of supply chain fulfillment. This will in turn result in the creation of lower cost for unique and small batch parts thereby reducing overall cost in these critical areas. Presently very slow print speed is a universal concern for 3D printing processes. By substantially speeding up the 3D process and reducing the amount of waste, the economic break-even point, where the cost of 3D printing equals the cost of plastic injection molding, is reached for a much smaller number of parts. The system cost is also expected to be similar or less than the system cost of present 3D systems while the materials cost is comparable to present methods since very similar powdered thermoplastic materials are used. The extremely high process speeds achievable with this innovative technology, coupled with the fact that this approach will work with full color thermoplastic materials, makes this a potential game changer for additive manufacturing.This project uses the technology found in office laser printers. This technology has never been used before in rapid prototyping systems. There have been previous attempts to harness laser printing technology but they have all found it difficult to make parts thicker than about a quarter inch. This project is a radical innovation in the application of the technology in that it separates two critical functions, transfer and consolidation, that have always been combined in previous attempts to use the technology. This innovation enables much greater control of both functions in a way that resolves the problem of building thicker parts by making the process look much more like that used in a laser printer. The innovation also allows the 3D printing of parts to be up to five times faster than any existing method. The anticipated technical result is to build multi-layer blocks of material quickly and uniformly layer by layer. The process does also include the capability to support parts during build. This is accomplished by using a second laser printer engine that creates an image of support powder that is transferred with the build layer image. The support layer can be dissolved away after the part is built.