3D printing has been considered a tool to quickly design and create prototypes. It is redefining the way we design products and here’s why:

Faster Design

3D printing allows designers to go directly from design to manufacturing. When you 3D print in-house instead of outsourcing your projects to a third party you can reduce print cycles up to 75%.
Reference: Save Time and Money with the Form 2

Innovation on the Fly

Companies are able to test their prototypes before committing to a specific design. 3D printing welcomes the age of rapid prototyping. Through rapid prototyping, designers are able to evaluate print failures more efficiently and improve their design.

Use Resources Efficiently

3D printing can produce the same technology as other types of heavy machinery at a fraction of the cost.3D printing in-house rather than outsourcing to a third party allows significant cost savings. According to a case study evaluated by one of our customers, they saved 93% by printing in-house. 3D printing in house allows your design to make design improvements quickly and cost efficiently.
Reference: Save Time and Money with the Form 2 

To learn more about 3D printing in house and when to outsource, you may be interested in the white paper, ‘When to 3D Print In House and When to Outsource.’ The white paper reviews three 3D printing methods and presents a pros and cons list comparing the methods.

The increased use of 3D printing, from hobbyists to professionals, has revolutionized the way ideas and products are brought to life. Multiple websites (GrabCAD, Thingiverse, etc.) provide over a million free downloadable files that can be printed on a variety of 3D printers. Everything from miniature drone blades to sci-fi figures to replacement parts for your vacuum cleaner are readily available. The possibilities for whatever application you have are almost unlimited. Almost. 

The key to giving your 3D designs unlimited potential for customization is CAD modeling software. While there are many accessible 3D printing files created by others, the most satisfying way to bring your ideas to reality are files created by you! Files for 3D printing can be created from scratch or existing files can by modified to suit your application. Without the ability to create unique parts, a 3D printer can quickly become a novelty. As soon as the excitement of first initial prints wear off, the use and return on investment reduces as well.

Read more to see how one company unlocks the true potential of CAD with 3D Printing.

Engineering Services Customer Case Study

A company that customizes enclosure trailers recently proved to be an excellent example of this limitation and how to solve it. The company wanted to use an off-the-shelf LED lighting product to illuminate the interior of a racing trailer. They needed to mount the LED lights in a clean manner and in specific locations to satisfy the customer’s needs. The company also wanted to locate the lighting switches discreetly. Since these parts would not be mass-produced the cost of a plastic injection mold could not be justified. They decided a series of 3D printed components would be the best method to meet their needs within the given delivery timeline.

While the company had access to a 3D printer, they did not have access to CAD modeling software. Despite extensively searching online trying to fulfill the requirements for these lighting components, nothing could be found to suit their needs.

The company came across EAC and decided to utilize the Engineering Services Group to save the day. A member of the Engineering Services Team created several CAD models using PTC Creo to design the customized lighting components. Within two hours, the stylized CAD models were complete and ready for printing. Three days later the 3D prints were finished and installed in the trailer.

Figures 1 illustrates the CAD with 3D printing files and Figure 2 illustrates the finished parts installed in the trailer. The parts were 3D printed using the Form 2 by FormLabs. The Form 2 is a high-quality stereolithography (SLA) 3D printer. In this case, the parts were printed using a clear resin (GPCL02) and then painted black. The parts were quickly produced to provide the custom enclosed trailer with a lighting solution that exceeded the customers expectations.

This project demonstrates a practical application of 3D printing when paired with CAD modeling software. With PTC Creo and the Form 2, the Engineering Services team was able to quickly create finished and functional parts that can provide unique and differentiating products without the capital investment sometimes required by plastic injection molding and other manufacturing processes.

It’s important to remember that the quality of your print depends on the quality of your design. If the CAD model is poorly designed, your 3D printed product may have flaws. The cleaner your design, the cleaner your print. Luckily for you, we can help! Find out why you should design your products using PTC Creo here. If you think you already have a great CAD modeling software and want to explore the Form 2 instead, go here.

Today, Formlabs announced they would be adding three new resins to their comprehensive library of Engineering Resins. They’ve been specifically designed for Formlabs’ printers by their in-house materials team. They’ve added new Durable, Tough, and High Temp Resins, and their Flexible Resin is as versatile as ever.

Introducing the Resins

Formlabs Engineering Resins simulate a range of injection-molded plastics, covering the full spectrum of properties required to conceptualize, prototype, test, and manufacture successful final products. With this lineup of resins, you can 3D print everything from functional prototypes to molds for final packaging right from your desktop.

Durable Resin

The Low Stiffness and Finish of Polypropylene. Another thermoplastic polymer, polypropylene (PP) is widely used for its low modulus and high-impact strength. PP is used for car bumpers, living hinges, plastic chairs, and food containers. Like PP, Formlabs’ new Durable Resin bends without breaking and is as smooth and glossy as everyday plastics.

This material is ideal for prototyping consumer products, packaging, and low-friction and low-wear moving parts. Use this wear-resistant, ductile material for parts where breaking would be the worst possible outcome, or for parts that need to deform multiple times.

**Durable Resin is under further development and will be available in January 2017. 

Durable Resin is perfect for prototyping products that will eventually be made of polypropylene, such as this container, which features a functional hinge and a snap-fit locking mechanism.

Tough Resin

ABS-Like Resistance to Stress and Strain. ABS is a thermoplastic polymer whose sturdy, shatter-resistant properties and resistance to stress and strain have made it a popular choice for functional prototyping and items like enclosures for consumer products, automotive trim elements, and household goods. Like ABS, our reformulated Tough Resin balances strength with elongation, so Tough parts absorb energy and begin to deform before they snap or shatter.

Tough Resin is more impact resistant than standard 3D printed parts, so it’s perfect for snap-fit joints, assemblies, and rugged prototypes. Use it for parts that need to resist breaking or deforming under a load and for its high geometric accuracy.

Tough Resin produces printed parts that are strong under tension, like when a strap is pulled tight.

High Temp Resin

The Highest HDT @ 0.45 MPa on the Market. Our new High Temp Resin has an HDT @ 0.45 MPa of 289 ºC–the highest on the 3D printing materials market. This material is great for static applications that will undergo higher temperatures.

High Temp Resin is ideal for testing hot air or fluid flow, static (no-load) applications, and production processes such as casting and thermoforming.

Moldmaking with desktop 3D printing allows engineers and designers to get much more functionality from their 3D printer, beyond prototyping alone. Download our white paper to learn more: Moldmaking with 3D Prints: Techniques for Prototyping and Production.

High Temp Resin can be used to print molds for molding and casting a wide range of thermoplastic materials.

Flexible Resin

Tactile and Compressible. Parts made with Flexible Resin can bend and compress, and are great for simulating soft-touch materials. Flexible is handy for parts that need to flex and bend, especially over time, and can be used to simulate an 80A durometer rubber. It’s great for prototyping grips and overmolds, cushioning and dampening, and wearables.

Flexible Resin is bendable, compressible, and impact-resistant.

The Development Process

This resin lineup emerged from a lot of research and consideration. “Basically every material that we launched for the first couple years was the first material of its kind available on the desktop. Now, we’ve had a couple years to see what use cases the materials are actually falling into,” said Formlabs Materials Scientist Alex McCarthy.

“We wanted to have a clear portfolio of resins. It should help people find the right resin for their applications,” added Materials Team Lead Max Zieringer.

What do You Look Forward to? 

“What’s exciting about working with 3D printer resins is that it’s such a quickly evolving application. You never really know what people are going to use it for. I’m really excited to see where people take our resins.” – Gayla Lyon, materials scientist at Formlabs

We’ve experienced lots of internal “aha” moments experimenting with these new resins, and one of the most exciting things about the development process is when we’re able to print something on the Form 2 that we couldn’t have created before. We’re even more excited to see what others do with our printers and this new lineup of materials.

Want to learn more about the new engineering resins? Contact our Additive Manufacturing Specialist for more information and to request a free sample part.

3D printing is changing the face of product design and manufacturing. The Form 2 by Formlabs allows companies to streamline their design processes with its user-friendly interface and low cost. Companies are no longer required to hire third party consulting firms to print a design and send it back– they can print it themselves in a matter of hours.

The Form 2 allows complete control at your fingertips. You can send prints over WiFi, re-print previous jobs, and manage your print queue through wireless connectivity. If you’re not nearby, not to worry, you can stay informed wherever you are by accessing your Printer Dashboard on your phone, tablet, or any other device. The printer will send you alerts when a print starts, finishes, or requires attention. The Dashboard will track previous jobs, resin usage, and manage multiple printers as you scale your operation.

One of our customers (that asked to remain nameless) experienced a dramatic increase in productivity and decrease in print costs after purchasing the Form 2. A primary concern of this company was project timeline compression. Their Form 2 purchase turned into a text-book example of cost and time-savings.

The client performed a study to evaluate the cost and time-savings associated with purchasing the Form 2 and printing designs in-house versus sending their prints to a third-party consulting company.

Here’s what they found.

Option A:

• Customer sends design to third party consulting company to print their design
• Cost: $300 per print
• Time: 3-4 business day cycle from ship to shop, print, ship back to customer

Option B:

• Customer sends design over WiFi to Form 2 3D printer
• Cost: $21 per print
• Time: 1 business day cycle

Which option would you choose? In this case, the Form 2 had the potential to pay for itself in a matter of prints, in less than two weeks. Think about how much money you pay third-party prototype houses. How does that number compare to the cost of putting a Form 2 on your desk? What are you waiting for?

For more information about the Form 2 contact our Additive Manufacturing Specialist here.

3D printing can be time consuming, expensive, and difficult, however that’s not the case with the Form 2 by Formlabs. The Form 2 is transforming the way engineers design, manufacture, connect to, and service their products.

After purchasing the Formlabs Complete Package Plus from EAC, Chris Herman, Principal at Scheme Inc. reported back to EAC – “35-minutes. Un-boxing, hardwire LAN (the machine notified me of the firmware update, by just turning it on), update, joined the WiFi network, sent the print. I then un-boxed the cleaning station while it was printing… and added it to my dashboard.”

Herman works across industries making prototypes for consumer, medical, and industrial goods. Many of his designs and prototypes are destined for human interaction; items that are tactile and handheld. He needed the versatility to meet and exceed his customer’s expectations.

Herman owns and has used a variety of 3D printers. According to him it is the price, build volume, accuracy, fit and finish, and wide variety of materials that set the Form 2 apart from its competition.

“I actually looked at the Form 1 right when [Formlabs] was coming out with it, it was right before the Form 1+. In talking with them I said, you know, it’s close but it’d be great if it was just a little bit bigger.” Formlabs listened to their customers and prospects and developed the Form 2 with a larger build volume of 145 x 145 x 175 mm. (Compared to the Form 1’s 125 x 125 x 165 mm)

When the Form 2 was released with the larger build volume, Herman said it was “totally in the sweet spot. They basically have a build volume I can easily get a handheld remote, consumer good, or anything like that.”

The biggest problem Herman faced with FDM printers is their dimensional accuracy. He stated that the surface finish and accuracy of the Form 2 is unbeatable. “The Form 2 is just a lot easier, the prints are crisp, and they print great,” said Herman.

3D printing with an FDM printer doesn’t work well for parts with very thin walls or delicate features that are very small. The filament is too big. Due to the fact that it’s laying down filament, there is a tendency for pores and air spaces in the part, and potentially pinholes when you get down to those very small scales. “The porosity becomes such a large percentage of what’s laid down, you end up with a weak part. That’s the extreme end of it, beyond getting a poor representation of the part, [FDM printers] just can’t print it,” said Herman.

The Form 2, on the other hand, features high-resolution, laser-sharp prints with an incredible surface finish. “This guy (the Form 2), like any other SLA, is seven-times more accurate in almost every direction. There’s tons of stuff that you can print. And don’t forget about all of the material options” said Herman.

Herman said industrial designers will especially appreciate the Form 2. “They don’t like the FDM because of its rough look. All of the engineers here love it, but we have four industrial designers who want the pretty parts that feel right or are easily sandable. FDM has too many processes: glaze it, sand it, prime it, and possibly fill it.“

Formlabs has two resin types Standard and Functional. Within these categories, there are a variety of resin materials: Standard (Clear, White, Grey, and Black), Flexible, Dental SG, Castable, and Tough.

Herman thinks industrial designers will really benefit from the soft touch (Flexible) material. Formlabs calls it Flexible Resin because it is tactile and impact resistant. It is a Functional Resin that brings versatility to your 3D printer.

When asked to name his favorite thing about the Form 2, Herman proceeded to show us a tray he printed and said “the surface finish and accuracy, that’s four hours of printing and less than an hours worth of hand finishing. You can’t beat it. You can’t beat it”

For more information about the Form 2 by Formlabs, contact our Formlabs Specialist here.

Recently you may have heard talk around the topic of agile engineering from PTC, Formlabs, and even us, here at EAC. We have many events throughout the year regarding lean product development; reviewing agile engineering, systems thinking methodologies, and more. Be sure to check if we’re hosting an event in your area here.

In the meantime, our friend Joris Peels over at Formlabs wrote an article discussing why agile engineering is the future of product design that reviews the benefits of agile engineering versus “the old way.”

In case you haven’t heard, in May EAC Product Development Solutions became a North American Channel Partner in the commercial, discrete manufacturing, and educational space. We now offer The Form 2 3D Printer to our customer’s to insert high-quality stereolithography (SLA) prototyping into their engineering and design workflows, for a fraction of the cost of competing technologies. Learn more about The Form 2 here.

Why Agile Engineering is the Future of Product Design

Agile Engineering is a popular process in software development, but few hardware teams apply these practices to develop physical products. For many hardware teams, implementing Agile Engineering practices saves time and money and improves the end product.

In Agile Engineering, teams quickly iterate, test, and gather feedback on product design. It divides big challenges into measurable chunks of work and promises more accurate and rapid product development cycles. Teams are self-managed and work in short two-week sprints driven by user feedback. This feedback guides teams to build a product that meets user needs.

Rather than start with a lengthy requirements phase that covers the entire span of the project, requirements are created as the team works. Requirements are specific and tied to user value. By testing features and new builds, teams verify if they are solving user problems and developing the right product.

The Benefits of Agile Engineering

With digital manufacturing tools such as mills, laser cutters, and 3D printers, hardware engineers can now develop ideas while concurrently testing them with users. Key benefits of this method include:

• Continuous collection of feedback from customers means that designs are tracking with customer needs.
• The interplay between design, engineering, manufacturing, and marketing allows teams to understand each other’s needs and challenges better.
• Each iteration gives you a physical prototype to hold and discuss. Kinesthetic learners, experiential learners, non-technical people in a technical meeting, people new to the subject matter–they will all learn from holding and discussing an actual prototype.
• Testing the physical prototype helps you identify and solve problems.
• More, quicker, and cheaper iterations mean that a higher number of possible solution paths can be explored.
• Continuous testing means that engineering risks are exposed throughout the process.

Agile Engineering unites teams across the organization and creates a better end product. By responding to user feedback with prototypes, teams develop products that users want.

The Old Way vs. Agile Engineering

In the “Old Way,” teams predicted demand months in advance. They turned a single prototype into mass manufactured goods. This method was risky: teams had a hard time predicting future demand. As a result, companies often had either product shortage or unsold inventory. Instead, Agile Engineering tests prototypes. It improves them with consumer feedback. This method develops products quicker and reduces risk.

*After week 7, an Agile team receives feedback on sales numbers. If the product is successful, and if it can be produced more cheaply using mass manufacturing, then they may decide to design the case for injection molding.

In the Old Way, the company has to predict market demand and consumer tastes months in advance. If Company A makes a decision once a season, and Company B makes informed decisions every day, then Company B will get ahead. Agile Engineering saves companies not only time, but also money in the long run. The Agile method has a higher startup time and initial cost, but the cost per final product is low. Plus, the end product is shaped by market demands, ultimately yielding greater profit.

Cost Comparison

Another benefit of Agile Engineering is that it encourages teams to fail quickly. By failing faster, teams learn and improve at a faster pace than those that do not. Learning from failure through prototypes helps companies quickly build better products. By validating assumptions and collecting data, these products are made in a more accurate, evidential way.

With traditional methods, teams painstakingly make world maps and then spend months planning a possible route through this imagined world. Only then do they have a product and really know where they stand. With Agile Engineering, products emerge in the first week of product development. Teams set off and check their compass often.