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a million polygons per square inch 3d printer
a layer of nkjet printed thermoshrinking polygons that shrinks but is edge connected with struts; plus an array of angles that directs the 3d aspect of the way the cured printed material curves plus forms | |
I have read at Technology review that sheets of polymer
that shrink when warmed are used to create microfluidic
machines (link)
This technology uses three layers of shrinkable polymer
nk jet printed on each other to create 3d machines
Noting that inkjet printers are above the 1k times 1k
resolution or million dots per square inch I think that
printing tiny blobs of these shrinking polymers as a kind
of tesselated surface will give a plastic surface that
when gently warmed or lasered creates a million polygon
per square inch 3d map of a constructable object rather
like a geodesic or paper building kit
the first layer is the polygons printed with a coefficient
of shrinkage of one; the next layer of printing is to print
connector struts between the polygons these connector
struts have a shrinkage factor of two
thus we would create a little mesh of polygons that were
edge to edge linked plus had struts reinforcing them
the third layer of printed polymer are V shaped
compressive angles that change their angle with curing;
as these shrink or grow they draw the polygons up n
around rather like a geodesic or a contourable form
Now this is nifty as inkjet printers currently have more
than 2k times 2k resolution or 4 million dots per square
inch; having that resolution of 3d contour printing is of
benefit
3 layers then curing process:
thus a layer of polygons that shrinks but is edge
connected with struts; plus an array of angles that
directs the 3d aspect of the way the cured printed
material curves plus forms
microfluidic machines from a popular shape changing polymer
http://www.technolo...ofile.aspx?TRID=764 [beanangel, Mar 13 2010]
rather like this but with three layers plus nkjet technology printing different shrinkage quotient polymers
http://www.technolo.../article/23263/?a=f [beanangel, Mar 13 2010]
[link]
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combine with other ink experiments, including printing conductive traces and even low power batteries. |
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Are your jets blocked? (sp. inkjet) |
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I like this idea quite a lot! Have a high-resolution 3D bun. |
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Presume the polygons are printed onto a smooth backing sheet that is removed before / when baking? |
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I like the idea of the sheet popping out the printer into an IR-lamp-warmed out tray, and popping off the backing sheet and forming into a beautiful sculpture or engineering model. |
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i can haz problemz of scale. |
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I agree with WcW, the height transformation
wouldn't be much. Pitching a tent only using a plane.
A printer that squirted, relatively
large, sticky platonic solids sounds good. |
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On second thoughts, A popup book works. Long
chains of 'pulling ropes' would have to be formed
independent of the wall surfaces. |
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I don't see a problem with height, and I don't see the need
for "ropes" either. The force of the shrinkage can be quite
substantial, allowing it to raise large "flaps" to the vertical.
There are also thermally expanding (irreversible) materials,
which could be used to oppose the shrinky ones, increasing
the amount of bending force available. |
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What I'm confused about is squirting tiny sized
droplets to produce 'millions' of popped polygons or
droplets forming cm scale sheets making objects like
that toy folding ball. |
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I suppose if the printer was flexible enough, it could
print both. |
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