DEVELOP3D November 2020 by X3DMEDIA

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WELCOME EDITORIAL Editor-in-Chief Al Dean al@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)7525 701 541 Managing Editor Greg Corke greg@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)20 3355 7312 Digital Media Editor Stephen Holmes stephen@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)20 3384 5297 Consulting Editor Jessica Twentyman jtwentyman@gmail.com +44 (0)20 7913 0919 Consulting Editor Martyn Day martyn@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)7525 701 542

DESIGN/PRODUCTION Design/Production Greg Corke greg@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)20 3355 7312

ADVERTISING Group Media Director Tony Baksh tony@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)20 3355 7313 Deputy Advertising Manager Steve King steve@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)20 3355 7314 US Sales Director Denise Greaves denise@x3dmedia.com +1 857 400 7713

SUBSCRIPTIONS Circulation Manager Alan Cleveland alan@x3dmedia.com +44 (0)20 3355 7311

ACCOUNTS Accounts Manager Charlotte Taibi charlotte@x3dmedia.com Financial Controller Samantha Todescato-Rutland sam@chalfen.com

ome weeks back, I promised myself I’d not talk politics on this page of the magazine anymore. I figured that most people are probably sick to their back teeth of having a wide range of politicos and pundits talking about all of the woes and ills of the world and passing yet another buck. Let’s face the facts: 2020 has been, if you’ll excuse the language, an absolute shitshow of a year. That said, it looks like the Year That We All Want To Forget might just turn things around before it closes out. It looks like a viable vaccine is on the horizon and might be ready for those who need it most before the year’s end. The rest of us could gradually get access to it over next spring. That’s assuming, of course, that government ministers haven’t accidentally given oversight of the contract to their friend Tarquin who took a gap year, fell off his polo pony and was forced to attend an NHS hospital for one afternoon back in 1987 – or whatever qualifies you for top government procurement jobs these days. Then there’s the more recent news from the USA. It looks like we might not have to suffer four more years of Trump after all. Not only that, the election of Kamala Harris as Vice President is a true milestone in history. Representation matters, and kids growing up today need to see that people just like them can achieve their goals. Frankly, there’s a lot we’re going to need the younger generation to achieve. On that point, just take a look at the engineering and design industry. It’s a lot more diverse than it used to be, depending on how you measure, but there’s still a lot of work to be done. There’s been talk of the skills gap in engineering and manufacturing for decades now; it’s time we looked at why. It’s not just about pay, it’s not just about gender, it’s not just about race – it’s all of those things, and more. Design, engineering and manufacturing need to open up, otherwise that skills gap we’ve been discussing will become a chasm that can’t be closed. It’s nice to finish the year on a positive note. Along with the brisk chill of autumn in the air, there’s something else hanging in the breeze: hope. Let’s make the most of it, folks. If 2020 has taught us anything, it’s that life and the future is a lot more fragile than we thought.

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RPW-252: Testing as of May 30, 2019 by AMD Performance Labs on a test system comprising of an Intel® Xeon® 4-core W-2125, 32GB RAM, Windows® 10 Fall Creators Update Professional 64-bit, AMD Radeon™ Pro WX 3200, AMD Radeon™ Pro Software Enterprise Edition 19.Q2 and Nvidia Quadro P620, 430.39. The SPECviewperf® 13 benchmark measures graphics performance with a variety of applications. The performance presented in Radeon™ Pro WX 3200 graphics workstation is greater in comparison to the Nvidia Quadro P620 graphics workstation as follows: - creo-02 scored 73.65 on the Radeon™ Pro WX 3200 graphics system while the Nvidia Quadro P620 system scored 58.32 for a comparison of 73.65/58.32=1.26 - snx-03 scored 110.53 on the Radeon™ Pro WX 3200 graphics system while the Nvidia Quadro P620 system scored a 92.59 for a comparison of 110.53/92.59=1.19. PC manufacturers may vary configurations yielding different results. Performance may vary based on use of latest drivers. SPEC® and SPECviewperf® are registered trademarks of Standard Performance Testing Corporation. Additional information about the SPEC® benchmarks can be found at www.spec.org/gwpg RPW-252

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CONTENTS NOVEMBER 2020 ISSUE NO. 122

NEWS HP and Dyndrite team up on Universal Build Manager, Autodesk announces new Fusion 360 Extensions and Nvidia launches new RTX A6000 workstation GPU

15 17 18 22 30 34 36

FEATURES Comment: Erin McDermott on rich media and teamwork Comment: Glen Smith on software upgrades Visual Design Guide: Sony ZV-1 camera COVER STORY Making a noise in high-end audio Talking heads: Experts weigh in on additive challenges Stratasys and Luxion’s colourful partnership Luma-ID rises to work-from-home challenge

40 45 48 52 56 57

REVIEWS Formlabs Form 3 Raise3D E2 MakerBot Method X Cricut Maker 3Dconnexion CADMouse range Fujitsu Celsius J5010

58 THE LAST WORD After many hours spent reviewing 3D printers for this month’s issue, Al Dean concludes that great hardware is one thing, but it’s often the software that really makes these devices sing 59 DEVELOP3D SERVICES

2021

8 September 2021 The wood used to produce this magazine comes from Forest Stewardship Council certified well-managed forests, controlled sources and/or recycled material

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NEWS

PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT TECHNOLOGY NEWS

HP TEAMS WITH ADDITIVE TECH START-UP DYNDRITE FOR UNIVERSAL BUILD MANAGER » The new HP Universal Build Manager software aims to solve some of the complex pre-processing and heavy computation involved in additive manufacturing

P's new Universal Build Manager is a “first of its kind” solution, according to company executives. It combines proprietary HP software and data innovation with the Dyndrite Accelerated Geometry Engine. In particular, the new additive manufacturing build manager takes advantage of the GPU-accelerated processing and Python scriptability inherent to Dyndrite’s engine. HP claims that this combination enables users to simplify and automate build preparation across their additive manufacturing technologies at supercharged speeds. The goal, it would seem, is for HP to provide a single platform that enables any organisation looking to take advantage of additive manufacturing at scale to manage its part production preparation processes – and do so in a highly efficient manner. The company is looking to offer this solution to those companies using a lot more than just its Multi-Jet Fusion machines. The UBM software supports all manner of production methods and machines, from MJF to FDM, from BJT to LBPF, from SLE to EBM. While it’s all well and good discussing process support, what this really needs is support and integration from the vendors developing those machines and this is where things get really interesting. Out of the box, HP’s UBM software will have immediate support for a range of additive manufacturing hardware vendors, including Aconity 3D, Aon3D, Aurora Labs, EOS, ExOne, Open Additive, Photocentric, Renishaw and SLM.

“We are addressing software challenges in the additive industry that have prevented it from becoming mainstream and are providing capabilities to help customers accelerate the journey to digital manufacturing,” said Ryan Palmer, global head of software, data and automation in HP’s Personalisation & Industrial Business. “The new HP Universal Build Manager simplifies, automates and delivers a digital-first approach to manufacturing. This solution will enable customers to explore new areas of complexity and value, push the boundaries of sustainable production and automate critical steps in their digital workflow.” This is the first time that Dyndrite’s muchdiscussed but rarely understood technology has been brought to market as a commercial product, an event that Dyndrite’s CEO and founder Harshil Goel is clearly relishing. He said: “Going forward, this moment will be recognised as the point where the additive manufacturing market broke away from the status quo of legacy technologies and file formats. Even before we founded Dyndrite, we knew we needed to work with industry leaders like HP, centered on pushing digital manufacturing forward. We are excited that HP shares our vision for software disruption and look forward to collaborating to push the boundaries of our innovation.” Hyperbole aside, this is certainly an interesting move for both companies: Dyndrite’s technology looks impressive, modern (the GPU support is interesting) and affords some interesting automation capabilities. It’s good to see it being used, rather than just pontificated about.

We should, perhaps, temper this by noting that both Dyndrite and HP are both newcomers to the additive game. Other companies offer analogous capabilities and have done so for decades. Also, HP needs to persuade other, competing machine vendors to sign up to this. The reality is that there are serious challenges to be addressed if additive is to truly compete with more traditional methods of manufacturing and part of that is process management. This isn’t just a question of buying a singular, monolithic build prep software to run on all of your machines. In fact, it’s considerably more complex than that – a point that HP’s Anthony Graves, senior director and head of product and strategy in digital manufacturing, picks up on. “Where there is a mission-critical need for parts at low volume, additive meets the need,” said Graves. “The ability to pivot immediately between jobs, without the need for tooling, with no minimum order quantities (MOQs), makes additive a critical asset. But now we have to fix the problems and scale the solution.” HP’s mission, as Graves expressed it, is to unlock the promise and potential of additive manufacturing through high performance, scalability and automation. And, as he pointed out, in this world, quality and accuracy of parts has to become the norm, not the exception. “Dyndrite and HP can deliver on all of that. We want to leverage modern technologies and innovate on them to enable additive to scale and reach its potential,” he said. HP’s Universal Build Manager will be going into beta shortly. hp.com | dyndrite.com DEVELOP3D.COM NOVEMBER 2020 9

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NEWS

AUTODESK TO ADD NEW FUSION 360 EXTENSIONS FOR 2021

Essentium inks USAF additive collaboration

ssentium has announced a contract with the US Air Force (USAF) to drive its development and deployment of advanced additive manufacturing. The goal is to help both USAF and the National Guard Bureau (NGB) develop applications in tooling, ground support and maintenance repair and overhaul (MRO), as well as flight-certified parts for military aircraft and ground vehicles. The multi-year collaborative contract is part of a $550M overall spend. essentium.com

utodesk has updated its plans for Fusion 360 Extensions as part of Autodesk University, being held virtually this year. This follows some fundamental changes in recent years to how Fusion 360 is packaged and sold. While the company took the decision to move away from a tiered pricing structure, removing the Fusion Ultimate package and rolling all of that functionality into the core Fusion 360 offering, it has also started to add back in layers of additional functionality (and additional subscription costs), using the Extensions approach. These are subscription-based sets of functionalities that serve specific areas of capability. At present, these Fusion 360 extensions are categorised by workflow. The costs vary by extension and by subscription terms, ranging from day access to an annual subscription. At Autodesk University (AU), the company announced plans to expand their capabilities, so let’s first take a look at work being done to currently available extensions. Machining Extension: The Machining Extension is where Autodesk is taking much of the know-how and experience from its Delcam products (especially PowerMill) and making core components available to the Fusion 360 user. Of course, this is over and above the already rich set of tools for machining and turning in the base-level product. Coming soon, the Machining Extension will also include full machine tool simulation. This will dovetail nicely with Autodesk’s recent acquisition of CAMplete and its CAM verification system. Generative Design Extension: This is Autodesk’s flagship technology and while it was initially focused on additively manufacturable forms, it has since been expanded to cover machining, die casting and more. At AU, the team will announce that fluid flow physics modelling will also be part of the generative offering, specifically targeting minimisation of pressure drop while avoiding obstacles. Additive Build Extension: When they first launched, the additive tools were bundled into the Manufacturing Extension, but have now been split out. While this set of tools will continue to

be developed, the next year should see a partner extension come online that handles metal build simulation so the new Additive Simulation Extension uses Netfabb’s simulation technology to help simulate the power bed fusion process, finding areas where errors occur during build.

M-Base acquired by Altair for plastics data

Alongside ongoing work on the new extensions in the coming year, 2021 looks like it will produce a bumper crop of new capabilities for Fusion 360. It also seems like someone has thrown open the cupboard doors at Autodesk HQ and dug out a bunch of technologies derived from Autodesk’s numerous acquisitions in the manufacturing space over the last decade or so.

-Base Engineering + Software, a supplier of material databases with a focus on plastics, has been acquired by Altair. According to Altair executives, M-Base brings with it “first-rate plastics material data supplied directly by material producers; deep knowledge in material database technology; and plastics material data preparation from raw data to data consumable by designers and engineers.” altair.com | m-base.de

Nesting & Fabrication Extension: Some years ago now, Autodesk acquired Magestic Systems which focuses on the processing of sheet materials, from sheet metal to composite. We’ve seen some of the technology from Magestics’ TruNest make it into Inventor, but as yet, not so much into the Fusion 360 environment. This new extension aims to help with some of the challenges in fabrication, particularly around nesting of sheet metal flat forms. Injection Molding Extension: Injection moulding simulation is something that Autodesk keeps pretty quiet about, considering it acquired Moldflow. It’s also one of those technologies that has never really gained the widespread adoption you might expect. While it’s not clear how much of Moldflow’s huge capability will make it into this extension, it should let you perform a pack, filling and warp analysis. Manage Extension: Last but not least, Autodesk is looking to introduce more extensive data and lifecycle management tools into Fusion. While there has already been some progress on this front with Fusion Teams, this extension looks likely to incorporate more traditional data management processes, such as part numbering, ECOs/ECN and other similar workflows. While prices are as yet unconfirmed and delivery dates for these new extensions vary, Autodesk executives say the company plans to have all of them available at some point in late 2020 or early 2021. autodesk.com

Hexagon buys DP Tech & EspiritCAM

exagon is to acquire DP Technology, the developer and supplier of the Esprit CAM System. Esprit is the flagship solution for DP Technology, which was founded in 1982 and is headquartered in Camarillo, California. Known for its machine-optimised, edit-free G-code, Esprit uses a digital twin simulation platform to model finished parts, tools and CNC machines. DP Technology will operate as part of Hexagon’s Manufacturing Intelligence division, which employs around 260 people in 27 locations worldwide. hexagonmi.com | espritcam.com

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NVIDIA LAUNCHES RTX A6000 GPU WITH 2X PERFORMANCE

he new Nvidia RTX A6000 workstation GPU promises to deliver more than double the GPU rendering performance of its predecessor, the Quadro RTX 6000. In the product designfocused rendering software Luxion KeyShot, Nvidia executives claim that performance increases could be 255%, or even more. Professional users can also expect a significant boost in graphics, VR and AI workflows, in sectors including product design, automotive design and architectural visualisation. The Nvidia RTX A6000 is the first professional GPU to be built on the Nvidia Ampere architecture. It is also the first to support PCIe Gen 4, appearing in workstations such as the Lenovo ThinkStation P620, which features the new AMD Threadripper Pro CPU. The Nvidia RTX A6000 is expected to be

the top-end model in the range and will be available in December 2020. Replacements for the mainstream Quadro RTX 4000 and RTX 5000 will likely come next year, but Nvidia would not be drawn on any details. The new GPU features 48 GB of GDDR6 GPU memory, double that of the Quadro RTX 6000, plus significantly improved processing cores, delivering a “2x performance-per-watt increase.” According to Nvidia, a total of 84 second-generation RT cores deliver up to two times the throughput of the previous generation, plus concurrent ray tracing, shading and compute. Meanwhile, 10,752 new CUDA cores deliver up to two times the FP32 throughput for significant increases in graphics and compute, and 336 thirdgeneration Tensor Cores provide up to five times the throughput in AI workflows. nvidia.com

The RTX A6000 features four DisplayPort 1.4 connectors, support for Framelock and NVlink and a max power consumption of 300W

Lenovo is now a reseller of Varjo's human eye resolution VR and XR headsets, further deepening the existing collaboration between the two companies. Users can now purchase ‘Certified for Varjo’ workstations alongside any Varjo device, directly from Lenovo lenovo.com

Volkswagen is providing suppliers with 3D data based on EPLAN Pro Panel as part of its VASS (Volkswagen Audi Seat Skoda) standard, with the aim of creating complete digital twins of control cabinets and the components inside them eplan.com

per cycle (IPC) improvement over the previous generation. The APEXX Denali is highly configurable and features up to two professional-grade AMD Radeon Pro or NVIDIA RTX GPUs, with support for PCIe 4.0 for maximum graphics throughput. boxx.com

Formlabs Rigid 10K Resin has been proclaimed “the stiffest material in Formlabs’ entire portfolio.” It can be used to create 3D-printed moulds and inserts and is suitable for short-run injection moulding workflows, since it is able to withstand high temperatures and immense pressure formlabs.com

Additive post-processing specialist Additive Manufacturing Technologies (AMT) has partnered with HP. The combination of HP’s MJF 3D printing technology and AMT’s chemical vapour smoothing systems is claimed to produce an “injectionmolded-quality finish” amtechnologies.com

AMD Ryzen 5000 CPU pushes BOXX workstation CAD performance OXX is among the first companies to offer the new Zen 3 AMD Ryzen 5000 CPU, which appears to have taken Intel’s crown in CAD-critical single-threaded performance. With the previous generation ‘Zen 2’ CPUs, AMD could only boast a performance lead in multi-threaded workflows, such as ray trace rendering, when compared to an equivalent Intel CPU, such as the Core i9-10900K. The APEXX Denali A3 workstation is purpose-built for Solidworks, Autodesk Revit, 3ds Max, Maya, Cinema 4D, V-Ray, and others. It features a choice of AMD Ryzen 5000 CPU, with up to 16 cores/32 threads at 4.9GHz with available overclocking through performance boost overdrive (PBO) and a 19% instructions

ROUND UP

The APEXX Denali A3 workstation from BOXX, featuring the new 'Zen 3' AMD Ryzen 5000 CPU

Evonik and HP have together developed a new flexible powder based on a thermoplastic amide grade (TPA) material. It's a lightweight, low-density (1.01 g/cm³) material with a Shore A hardness of 91, making it ideal for parts that call for high extensibility and energy return evonik.com | hp.com

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NEWS

EPSON LAUNCHES ‘LOW-COST’ SURECOLOR LARGE PRINTERS

Oqton FactoryOS gets integration with EOS AM

qton FactoryOS now has integrated EOS software capabilities, helping to make it an end-to-end production platform for EOS’ polymer and metals 3D printers. Oqton FactoryOS allows users to send 3D print jobs from the cloud directly to a 3D printer anywhere in the world. It enables alerts to mobile devices when a build is ready; offers a full job quality report with every produced part; and automatically optimises part nesting and build job schedules to maximise machine use. oqton.com

pson has launched two ‘low-cost’ Surecolor multi-function, large-format printers, designed to fit into small workspaces. The CAD-focused 3-in-1 devices, which offer print, copy and scan capabilities, come in two sizes: the 24-inch (A1) SureColor SC-T3100M and the 36-inch (A0) SureColor SC-T5100M. Prices start at £1,346 without the optional stand. The new Surecolor printer series features a top-loading 600dpi scanner, which can accurately replicate documents in various formats – PDF (standard and encrypted), JPEG or TIFF – and then send them to a USB drive, mail server or network folder. It can also scale original copies (25-400%). A tray supports scanned documents to avoid valuable originals being damaged on the floor. The range has been designed to be dust-free as standard, with print quality and internal components protected. According to Epson, this makes these products ideal for environments such as construction

site offices and high footfall areas. There is support for both roll feed and cut sheets and automatic switching between the two does not require human intervention. Both printers feature a 4.3-inch touchpanel LCD, and connectivity is via built-in WiFi, Apple AirPrint or USB/LAN. Epson offers two main sizes of ink cartridge – 26ml or 50ml – as well as an 80ml black cartridge, in order to support both low-volume, occasional users and those who require regular prints. According to the company, the series benefits from pigment-based inks that provide colour stability, water resistance and light-fastness, which is useful for technical drawings and documents that need to be archived for long periods. Both the SC-T3100M and SC-T5100M are supported by the Epson Cloud Solution PORT platform, which enables users to update and monitor equipment across several sites, from the production floor to remote locations. epson.co.uk

Stratasys and nTopology team up to provide rapid design for jigs and fixtures in nTop

tratasys and nTopology have announced that they are working together on a project to make the design of jigs, fixtures and other manufacturing supportive parts easier when using nTopology’s nTop Platform. This will take the form of a customisable set of tools that will include a new FDM Assembly Fixture Generator inside nTop Platform. This is the first time that we’ve seen nTopology release workflows in collaboration with another vendor, but considering the level of cooperation we’re seeing right now in the additive industry, we suspect it won’t be the last. Jigs and fixtures have always been a

sweet spot for additive manufacturing, due largely to its quick turnaround times compared to other production methods, and particularly in larger organisations, where running such parts through the machine shop often introduces unnecessary delays to production preparation projects. The new add-in is already available to nTop users as a download from the company's website. ntopology.com | stratasys.com

3D Systems sells GibbsCAM and Cimatron

D Systems' lengthy restructuring has led to the sale of a hefty part of its CAM business to Battery Ventures, owners of SigmaTek. Cimatron and GibbsCAM will join SigmaTek in a new holding company named Cambrio. Cambrio will leverage Cimatron and GibbsCAM to offer “a diverse set of design and machining software solutions”, with the hope of becoming a CAD/CAM innovator in the fabrication and toolmaking industries. cambrio.com

Sandvik joins GE Binder Jet Beta Partner Program

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he GE Additive Binder Jet beta partner programme has announced the addition of Sandvik Additive Manufacturing. Sandvik has one of the widest alloy ranges for additive manufacturing on the market, with products marketed under its Osprey brand. It will work closely with GE Additive to become a certified powder supplier for a range of Osprey alloys that directly complement GE Additive’s own materials portfolio and will also use its H2 Binder Jet beta machine to support internal and external customers. ge.com | sandvik.com

12 NOVEMBER 2020 DEVELOP3D.COM

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COMMENT

Data-rich media can be a huge help in promoting better communication and comprehension in collaborative tasks. It’s time we used more imagination and ingenuity in the ways we put it to work, writes Erin McDermott

arlier this year, before pandemic roadblocks made travelling difficult, I toured FoVI3D in Austin, Texas. The company is developing some absolutely mind-blowing technology to make 3D light field displays. These screens generate three-dimensional images that change depending on your perspective. But FoVI3D is doing more than just adding optical illusions to make 2D things appear in 3D. This tech actually displays different data as you move in relation to the screen, just as if you were looking at a real object in real life. Thomas Burnett, president and chief technology officer of FoVI3D explained to me that, in critical situations, such as military events, having data-dense media like this yields proven advantages. For example, if soldiers draw a scene with sticks and dirt in the ground, a lot gets missed in communication. “Hold up, was that rock the car or the tree?” With a 2D aerial photo of a scene, by contrast, there’s less risk of misinterpretation. Then, if you go to a 3D map where you, yourself, can physically move around from the top of a building to a side view where you see individual levels, comprehension exponentially increases. 3D maps are even proven to speed up comprehension!

REMOTE TEAMS Today, as many of us struggle to work together in remote teams on physical products, I believe this lesson of data-rich media is directly relevant. Recently, I saw this concept play out with instruction. I’m the corporate thesis advisor to a student who finished his mechanical engineering classwork in the early 2000s. At the time, he wasn’t able to get a corporate sponsor to complete his thesis, however, so he never technically graduated. When I encouraged him to play around in Fusion 360, he expressed hesitation. He feared it would be too daunting to learn on his own, having been away from university for so long. However, from needing to pick up several new software packages on the fly throughout my career, I knew a lot of learning challenges stem from the forms of

instruction available. That’s when a 3D modeling pro in my network, Adam James, serendipitously created a YouTube tutorial on Fusion 360 for beginners. Unlike other tutorials, James doesn’t simply explain each feature separately in a monotone, disjointed lecture. Instead, he takes the viewer step-by-step through modeling a real-life example: a phone stand. After my co-op thesis student ran through the lesson, he seemed excited, instead of daunted. Having this real-life example helped him grasp how each CAD function fit into the design process. Plus, he was stoked about being able to 3D print his work afterward.

HIGH IMPACT In my own work, I didn’t realise how impactful data-dense media was until I communicated some basic optical engineering work with pictures. Oftentimes, a widget is lit up in ways no one wants. This happens when some rays of light misbehave and go on a walkabout. On the right is a wildly ugly example in which three LEDs are placed inside the purple geometry and light shines outward. The spherical cut-out at the top right, has a light receiver applied. Let’s pretend the client doesn’t want any light coming through that cut-out. There, the dark blue of the false colour plot means ‘no light’, and other colours mean light is hitting the surface. Mostly, I’m checking out that false colour plot. However, when talking to a client who doesn’t speak my dialect of nerd, sometimes more literal depictions work better. That’s when I add in the colourful squiggles which are the exact light rays causing the problem. It’s like video footage of a crime being committed! With this addition, other disciplines pull out much more understanding. Mechanical engineers can think about how to physically block those rays with added surfaces. Electrical engineers can see how one LED contributes more to the problem and consider knocking down the power to that diode. This type of analysis is also well worth the effort, because it is much simpler to produce than it was years ago with other software. What about your communications? How

3 many dimensions of data are you using? Are there ways to make your lessons, reports and tough technical concepts more visual and more ‘real’ to make them easier to grasp? Technology makes great advances all the time, so it’s good to check that your communications are keeping up!

1 Example of ●

FoVI3D’s technology 2 ● 3 View in ●

LightTools of the culprit stray rays of light caught in the act

GET IN TOUCH: Erin M McDermott is director of optical engineering at Spire Starter and a digital nomad (read: vagrant). She travels the world meeting hardware engineers who don’t know that things using light (cameras, LED illumination, LiDAR, lasers and so on) need competent design, optimisation and tolerancing like the rest of their widget. Get in touch at spirestarter.com or @erinmmcdermott DEVELOP3D.COM NOVEMBER 2020 15

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COMMENT

Let’s talk about software updates: when you should go for it, when you should hold back, and how you should decide which version is the ‘right’ version for your organisation, writes Glen Smith

ast month, we heard about issues with the Test and Trace programme in the UK, resulting in incorrect counts of positive COVID tests. Test results were filed in the form of text-based lists. An automatic process then pulled this data together into Excel templates, so that it could be uploaded to a central system and made available to the NHS and government dashboards – and this is where problems arose. As a self-confessed automation nerd, I was disappointed to think that the project appeared to have fallen down at the automation stage. Automation is powerful. I could talk about it all day, but it’s safe to say that, if you automate a bad manual process, then you may well be masking serious problems. So, what happened with Test and Trace? From what I’ve read, it sounds as if the system’s developers were using an old, unsupported file format: XLS instead of XLSX. In the Excel XLS format, each template could handle only about 65,000 rows of data, rather than the one million-plus rows that Excel is actually capable of handling. Since each test result created several rows of data, in practice, that meant that each template was limited to about 1,400 cases. When the total was reached, further cases were simply left off.

Perhaps also it’s the fear of change; if that’s the case, I highly recommend the book ‘Who Moved My Cheese?’ Or maybe it’s the old thinking: “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.” But all too often, we only find out that something is broken when it’s too late. Just because a new release might not have enough new features to get you excited, security and maybe performance should still be good reasons to upgrade. And as others in your customer base and supply chain upgrade, by not upgrading yourself, you risk losing compatibility. Now, I do appreciate that, if we’re not careful, we could spend all of our time performing upgrades and not doing the work we’re paid to do. But going back to Test and Trace, there is a big difference between running every update as soon as it’s available, and not updating from a file format that was superseded in 2007. To give this some context, that’s the Windows XP era, well before the launch of the iPad, and when Tony Blair was still Prime Minister of the UK.

CLOUD ARGUMENTS

MASSIVE SECURITY RISK Using an old, unsupported file format doesn’t just risk data loss, as we’ve seen here. It can also be a massive security risk. Old file formats are more vulnerable to viruses and hackers. Microsoft itself has been urging us all to update to newer standards. XLS files can have vba code embedded in them to run when opened, and many corporate spam filters do and should block any XLS attachments. (My own house purchase was delayed by two weeks, just because the other side’s solicitor insisted on sending older XLS and doc files.) This highlights the importance of always using the latest version. Software and hardware may be updated regularly with shiny new features to draw us in, but the security improvements they contain are often even more important.

Unless you are using software-as-a-service (SaaS), and paying monthly or yearly subscriptions, moving to the latest version in the CAD world usually means having a current maintenance and upgrade contract in place. But even that doesn’t mean that companies always upgrade as soon as they might. They may wait, for example, until a service pack is released. More often than not, the main reason given not to upgrade is that the software isn’t at the second service pack yet. The assumption here is that, if you wait for SP2, all the bugs will be fixed. Not true.

I understand the arguments from the cloud CAD companies that their approach removes worry about upgrades and the time spent performing them. However, customers are often at the mercy of browser developer upgrades and also run the risk of deploying too many updates, so often that users quickly find that they just can’t keep up. It’s about making an educated decision. If a new version has features that will save you time, then upgrade. If you read the release notes and there are security upgrades, then upgrade. If it’s more than a year since your last upgrade, you should probably upgrade. Staying on the same version for too long is a risky step to the point where a failure of some description is inevitable. Not upgrading at all, however, should not be an option.

GET IN TOUCH: Glen Smith is CEO of DriveWorks. We agree entirely about users being at the mercy of browser developers. Get in touch with Glen at driveworks.co.uk or @driveworks DEVELOP3D.COM NOVEMBER 2020 17

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VISUAL DESIGN GUIDE SONY ZV-1 Designed from the ground up for content creators, Sonyâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ZV-1 combines easy-to-use features with advanced imaging, making it the perfect tool for all skills levels

SELFIES IN FOCUS The ZV-1 was designed with content creators and vloggers in mind. This compact, lightweight camera (approximately 294g and 105.5mm x 60.0mm x 43.5mm) is the first Sony compact camera with a side-opening Vari-angle LCD Screen, allowing creators to simplify set-up by utilising the multi-interface (MI) shoe for optional external mics without the need of an additional mounting bracket

DESIGNED TO VLOG The ZV-1 was designed to be held with one hand, thanks to the easy-to-hold comfortable grip and a large movie REC button located on the top of the camera for quick access to videorecording. Plus, a recording lamp on the front indicates when the camera is actively recording

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AUDIO ADD-ONS The ZV-1’s directional 3-capsule mic is designed for clear, forward-directional audio capture and minimal background noise. For added flexibility, the ZV-1 also features a standard 35mm mic jack MI shoe that make it easy to connect a wide range of external microphones. The ZV-1 is also supplied with a windscreen accessory that fits onto the MI shoe to minimise wind interference

ZEISS OPTICS The ZV-1 features a 1.0-type stacked Exmor RS CMOS image sensor with DRAM chip and 24-70mmF1.8-2.8 ZEISS VarioSonnar T large-aperture lens, to create beautiful bokeh, allowing the subject to stand out from the background

FOLD-OUT LCD The ZV-1 is Sony’s first compact camera with a side-opening Vari-angle LCD touchscreen. To meet any video need, the ZV-1 contains advanced video features including 4K movie recording and in-body image stabilisation

NEXT STEPS

The Sony Vlog Camera ZV-1 is now available priced at approximately £700 sony.com

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ADVERTISING FEATURE

SIMULATION AT THE SPEED OF THOUGHT

How TEN TECH LLC is taking advantage of the latest CPU and GPU technology from AMD to bring answers to its customers faster than ever before

EN TECH LLC was founded with a simple business model in mind: quality always prevails over quantity. It provides manufacturing companies with high-end mechanical engineering design, analysis, physical testing support and hardware prototyping services. Alongside its engineering services, the company is also a reseller for a range of simulation technologies from Dassault Systèmes, Siemens Digital Industries, MSC.Software among others. To learn more about what TEN TECH LLC does, AMD sat down with chief technology officer William Villers and discovered a company that takes providing efficient and accurate simulation services to its clients at its very core. “We are primarily a contractor, supplying engineering design and simulation services,” says Villers. “Our core competency is shock and vibration, thermal and aerodynamics, particularly in aerospace and space related electronics. “We also design and build things and have the expertise to do this in house, so we naturally engage in helping others design hardware outside of the military field, such as medical and consumer products.” Alongside the provision of contracted simulation consultancy, TEN TECH LLC has also recently begun to build research and develop its own products involving quadcopters and UAVs (Unmanned Aerial What connects TEN TECH LLC’s customers is a desire to better Vehicles). These products are typically used for sensor development understand the performance of their products or current product and testing, whether that’s a wind speed sensor, an IR camera or concept in the real world. To achieve this outcome, TEN TECH GPS units that are integrated into a quadcopters. LLC’s team has built up a set of skills that focus on delivering “It’s almost a side project,” says Villers, “But it’s far more fun than simulation results that are both robust (in terms of suitability to the doing stuff on the computer as you actually get to touch hardware. information required from the simulation), but also delivered in a Breaking things in real life is a lot more fun that breaking things on timely manner. the computer! There’s a lot more satisfaction in having pieces in As Villers explains, “As much as software companies want to say your hand rather than red is bad, blue is good, on the screen.” that their tool is the tool for everything, we know for a fact that this TEN TECH LLC’s customer list reads like a who’s who of advanced is not the case. In engineering and many of our projects, manufacturing, we use three or four with its typical different software engagement varying greatly. “We Breaking things in real life is a lot more fun than breaking things tools that you might see as competing have companies on the computer. There’s a lot more satisfaction in having pieces with each other or that don’t have in your hand rather than red is bad, blue is good, on the screen. overlapping.” much of an idea “So, we have the of what we do ability to pick and for a living and choose, jump from they need to have one to the other, some simulation based on which tool does a better job than the others. work done to qualify their products. We also have companies that “At a large company, you can’t afford to do that simply because have never become involved in aspects of harsh environments and they have 300 users, so they can’t just buy one of each. They have vibration simulation before or do not have in-house capability. a large budget, but they have to make decisions that are based on “We get to participate in design reviews and represent our a company’s standard or an ability for the teams to be trained and customers as their Subject Matter Experts for shock & vibration or work together.” thermal management.” TEN TECH LLC doesn’t have this issue as all of its users have an Additionally, TEN TECH LLC also often carries out simulation intimate knowledge and competence in three or four different projects for large companies that already have teams in place; this products. “We acquired that expertise a lot faster than other can be because they either need help due to increased workload, or companies because we don’t have time to breathe and we just they need a particular expertise or set of tools that TEN TECH LLC get on with the job, because nobody gives us time to do that stuff. can bring to the table.

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ADVERTISING FEATURE

So, we have to adapt and pick the best tools; tools being software or hardware.”

SPEED VS COST: THE BOTTOM LINE It’s often the case that technologies are seen as either being the fastest or the cheapest – but rarely both. Villers feels that when it comes to the hardware that he and his team selects for their demanding simulation work, both in computation capability and speed of delivery, AMD provides them with the ability to not only deliver solid, robust results, but to gain serious competitive advantage from it. According to Villers about computational speed and how it influences TEN TECH LLC’s bottom line, Villiers’ opinion was that speed is definitely providing them with bottom line benefits. As he says: “We’re able to deliver to our customers faster so that makes us more reactive. “We’ve invested heavily, probably more than the typical small business, but we’re not just geeks that marvel at the latest shiny gizmo. “If a piece of hardware does our job in six hours instead of eight, that’s two hours a day we can push two hours of something else. As a result, we’re able to deliver faster than general because of the investment we’re making in software and hardware, so this sets us apart from large companies where the main issue is inertia: they can’t just go and buy $50,000 of hardware just because they want it. “We can and we do.” But is speed the be all and end all of the selection choice? For TEN TECH LLC, it would appear that speed is an equal factor alongside Return on Investment (ROI). “The [AMD] Radeon Pro VII is a good example of jumping on new technology to gain an advantage that’s not just about speed,” says Villers. “We’re a small company so price vs. speed ratio and ROI influence our decisions. The main competitor of AMD has equivalent hardware, but the main advantage of AMD is to be far more affordable.” The Radeon™ Pro VII is a graphics card that has 16GB of extremespeed RAM, and is optimized for double-precision calculations, so

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The acceleration we can get on some of the CAE and finite element solvers when you plug in a Radeon Pro VII is incredible; you get 2x performance simply by having that graphics card. ROI, for us, is that it pays for itself in less than a week. So why wouldn’t we do that?”

simulations are displayed all fully shaded, all texture mapped on screen of large assemblies, as you would expect. But on top of that, it’s also a GPU accelerator and that’s one of the technologies that TEN TECH LLC have investigated in some depth. “The acceleration we can get on some of the CAE and finite element solvers when you plug in a Radeon Pro VII is incredible; we get 2x performance simply by having that graphics card. ROI, for us, is that it pays for itself in less than a week. So why wouldn’t we do that? There’s absolutely no question - it really is as simple as that!” DELIVERING THE GOODS For TEN TECH LLC, delivery of detailed, accurate and complex simulation results in a timely manner is key. “We do not charge our customers for compute time. We don’t spend our time spinning our wheels making ridiculously large models that take forever to solve, so we can charge our customers more. Instead, we are using hardware to our advantage to lower all costs of doing business. Our customers pay us for results, a study or a simulation, and we should have the tools to allow us to do that, so it’s our cost, it shouldn’t be theirs – that’s pretty unique. As Villers concludes, AMD is providing TEN TECH LLC with ample opportunity to move its business forward and that comes down to speed and cost. “For us, we need the fastest all the time because we save resources and our money by doing that. AMD’s GPU price performance, I think, is unbeatable. The hardware is top notch at a price that’s shockingly low sometimes”. amd.com/RadeonProVII | tentechllc.com

10/11/2020 09:59

PROFILE

Â» Node Audio is aiming to make a big noise in the high-end audio market with its new Hylixa design. Stephen Holmes visits the UK start-up to learn how additive manufacturing is enabling it to reshape loudspeaker concepts

Node Audio offers high-end speakers with a unique look and a worldclass sound

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 The look is quite sinuous and seamless, which is great for acoustics, because it doesn’t reflect sound. It’s ‘acoustically stealth’, as we like to say Ashley May, Node Audio



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PROFILE

1 1 Node Audio ● here’s a striking, sinuous flow to the form of Node Audio’s blends a hand-built Hylixa loudspeaker. Almost every familiar element of a approach with the traditional loudspeaker is missing: the square edges, the latest technologies boxy shape, the piano-black gloss. Instead, Hylixa’s creators have built something far more shapely, more elegant, but with functional benefits firmly in mind. There’s barely a flat surface in sight, all the better to allow the sounds from its passive, three-speaker set-up to flow around its surroundings unimpeded, creating the impression that the musician is right there in the room with the listener. The 3D-printed speaker pod is perched on an aerodynamically rounded shaft. The first impression is of a product originating from the aerospace industry, rather than the acoustic field. Everything is anchored, meanwhile, by three squat stabilising feet. From an aesthetic point of view, a pair of these £30,000 speakers will certainly catch the eye in pretty much any room – but it’s the gargantuan sound they emit that will fill that space. That’s the result of Node Audio’s patent-pending internal design for the Hylixa, which is radically different from anything that has preceded it. The rear-firing bass woofer channels through a freeflowing ‘transmission line’, where the rotational pressure of an inner helix-shaped chamber increases the effective length, extending bass performance dramatically. It’s from

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PROFILE There’s ‘‘ no reason

why you can’t design something really quite beautiful that actually enhances the acoustics

’’

this chamber, incidentally, that the name Hylixa is derived. Coupled with an acoustically streamlined cabinet, which delivers exceptionally low diffraction, the full sound spectrum reaches your ears at the same time, without the colouration generated by those box-like cabinets.

ORIGIN STORY The Hylixa design originated with company founders Ashley May and David Evans, already successful directors of design consultancy, Studio17. Having developed products for the likes of homeware specialists Joseph Joseph and Fiskars for the last decade, they began work on the Hylixa concept as a side project. It was only when they consulted an acoustic engineer about their design, and saw how enthusiastic they were about the idea, that May and Evans decided to take it further. The initial stages of that process focused on iterating the original designs and working with the audio engineer to hone the best shape and sound possible from the transmission line. Traditionally this is done inside a box cabinet, by creating internal walls within that form a long path. However, by 3D printing the cabinet, Node Audio’s design team figured out they could create whatever shape would give the clearest sound. The resulting helix creates a very low impedance path because of its continuous round form, so air and sound both flow very efficiently around that path.

As Ashley May puts it: “There’s no reason why you can’t design something really beautiful that actually enhances the acoustics, rather than compromises them.” The 3D designs for Hylixa took shape in Solidworks, allowing the team to send designs back and forward to the audio engineer who analysed the form in Comsol Multiphysics, running acoustic and vibration simulations on the cabinet design, as well as other FEA analysis to ensure structural stability. “Once we had something that was proven in simulation, that’s when we started prototyping to see if it worked in real life,” explains David Evans.

INNOVATION CENTRE Node Audio is headquartered on the ARCC Innovations campus, close to Cambridge. The heartland of British audio engineering, the site provides a collaborative workspace for start-ups, inventors and technologists looking to bring new products to life. As part of its tenancy agreement, Node Audio has access to design software such as Solidworks, which is maintained by reseller Innova Systems, as well as a wide range of fabrication equipment, including onsite 3D printing using a 3D Systems sPro 60 SLS printer. “Having access to something like this, and us being designers and understanding what’s now possible with technology like this. I think that’s where the product was born, almost.” says Evans. In other words, it was a unique opportunity to explore what they could achieve with this kind of kit and set-up, which would otherwise be out of reach because of the costs involved. Each speaker pod is built to order, with parts nested together and created from 3D Systems’ glass fibre-filled Nylon material, DuraForm GF, which feels almost ceramic to the touch when holding a part this large. May explains that, in acoustic terms, flat surfaces are generally a bad thing, since they resonate. “We’re able to eliminate that completely by using double curves throughout the entire 3D form, and it’s manufactured as a single coalesce piece, so there’s no fixings to resonate. This process ticks a lot of boxes, it really does!” The material boasts excellent properties for speaker cabinets. “You can feel the density,” he says, “but it has a high resonant frequency, which means that when we play the bass frequencies through it, we’re not exciting the cabinet. It’s not resonating at the crucial operating band.” One of the things that the team realised was that designing the product was one challenge, but the manufacturing process also had to be well thought-out to achieve a product of a sufficiently high quality. “A good example is how, when these come off the 3D printer, it’s not a bad finish, but it’s not a high-quality finish that you’d expect from a premium product,” May says, assessing a part straight out of the depowdering unit.

2 The body of the pod is designed ●

so that the key components all stack inside one another for economical 3D printing 3 Once removed from the 3D printer, ●

the parts are de-powdered and deep cleaned

4 The exterior is machined to give a ●

perfect surface before paint is applied

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PROFILE When the ‘‘ light falls on it, you get a nice, consistent, almost automotive quality to the surface

’’

Because of the torturous internal geometry, the team created a QA process to be absolutely certain that no unsintered powder is left inside the helix, where it could ruin the acoustics. Each cabinet is weighed against a reference model as it goes through the depowdering process. To check the inside is clear, an endoscopic keyhole camera is used. “It’s a really important part of the process, and it’s really the only way we can be sure that there’s nothing in there, because there are slight variances in terms of weight and density of parts, depending on the [powder] build blend in the 3D printer. But we try and keep that tolerance as tight as possible,” says May. The external surface underwent further work as the team strove for the highest-quality finish over several iterations. First, a protruding neck section was removed, leaving a purely circular form. The cabinet was then calibrated to be printed oversize, so that excess material could be turned back using the lathes in the ARCC facility. The mouth of the speaker was tweaked to allow for an aluminium mandrel to be attached, allowing it to be easily mounted onto the lathe. The smoothed finish was then coated with a primer, several layers of paint, and then a lacquer that is subsequently polished back to a ‘pianograde’ finish. “It just means that when the light falls on it, you get a nice, consistent, almost automotive quality to the surface,”

reflects May. “It’s these processes that you need to go through to take SLS from a prototype process to a proper end-use part.”

HIGH FIDELITY

To push Hylixa to the highest possible level of acoustic fidelity, 3D printing is used beyond the speaker cabinet, too. Each of the speaker’s three specially sourced drivers are paired up in-house to ensure the balance of sound is close to perfect, with a custom 3D-printed surround added to help stiffen the flange, again in the interests of achieving the best possible sound. The crossover – the electrical filter element of the loudspeaker that divides up the signal coming in from the amplifier to each of the three drivers – is also managed in a unique way. Traditionally, a crossover is built using printed circuit boards, with each component mounted on and soldered. But with Hylixa, Node Audio has instead packaged the crossover neatly into the structure of the stand, using HP MultiJet Fusion 3D printing technology. “We’re maximising every detail, so we’ve taken this to the nth degree,” says May. “We’re using a 3D printing process to create the chassis and that removes any micro vibrations or resonance that you get through a PCB, which degrades the performance of every one of these components.” He continues: “It’s a pretty rigid structure and every

7 5 The crossover is packaged and ●

hardwired in a custom 3D-printed casing 6 ● 7 The airflow from the rear-firing ●

bass driver is unimpeded, flowing cleanly through the unique helix structure

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element is hard-wired, which essentially sounds better than a PCB.” 3D-printed wire runs and bays for each inductor create consistency within the structure, with the neat array forming a magazine that is loaded into the underside of the stanchion, sitting within the slender stand. Says May: “We take great care to space all the inductors out, so there’s no electrical coupling in between the two. So the orientation and the location is really important. There are numerous small wins that we can get from using the 3D printing process, even on hidden areas that a customer never sees.” For the parts that the customer can see, such as the splayed base legs, meanwhile, Node Audio had the HP 3D-printed parts extensively UV-tested to simulate the effect of daylight over several years. Although the parts are all vibro-polished and dyed, the team found that customer-facing parts would still need automotive-grade paint applied to the outside to negate colour fading over time. 3D printed wire runs continue the length of the stand, helping keep the cables separate from each other and from the extruded aluminium outer. This controls the consistency of where the wires sit and avoids any minute degradation of the signal passing through them. Assembly is performed in-house, using further 3D printing processes to build jigs and fixtures. Final touches, including the front aluminium baffle and two sets of feet (for either carpet or hard floor), are added. Machined and electroplated locally, the aluminium highlights, combined with the range of paint colours available, increase the level of customisation for this made-to-order product. This enables users to adapt the appearance of their speakers during their lifetime to suit their living environment. “We’re trying to create something of real beauty, where there’s no harsh edges. It’s quite sinuous and seamless, which is great for acoustics, because it doesn’t reflect sound. It’s ‘acoustically stealth’, we like to say!” May jokes. By contrast, the final product experience for the customer is nothing like as covert, having been extensively thought through. With each purchase comes a glamourous accessory box, containing the adjustable feet, a custom spirit level to help set the speakers up and a book detailing the design and production story behind the kit. Way before they receive their product, in fact, customers are invited to visit the site, in order to see their speakers take shape and observe the production process they go through. In that respect, the experience is more akin to buying a luxury car. If the customer is based further afield, and can’t make an in-person visit to Node Audio, they can work with the team online to assess colour and finish options. Here, the team uses Solidworks Visualize to create realistic 3D renders.

We’ve ‘‘ really

impressed people. It’s extremely different to what they’re used to seeing

’’

But the real end result is the sound that these speakers produce. To date, no customer has been disappointed, according to Evans. “We’ve really impressed people. It’s been extremely different to what they’re used to seeing,” he says. The amazing sound produced often fools people into expecting to see a giant set of traditional speakers, he adds, “whereas we’re getting the same performance from something more elegant, beautiful and a lot smaller.” The form of Hylixa was driven by the function, at the end of the day, he concludes. “But we also wanted to make something that looks as good as it sounds.” Job done. node-audio.com

8 The Hylixa has a striking aesthetic ●

that sets it apart from competing products

9 3D printing enables the design to eek ●

out every last ounce of performance

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HIT PRINT FOR THE FUTURE

BART VAN DER SCHUEREN CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICER MATERIALISE

as more and more CAD designs are used as basis for volume AM production, but also to maintain a link to CAM post-processing steps, following the print process. That is why Magics not only accepts a multitude of CAD formats as input, but also enables a STEP workflow to always show the differences between nominal design and AM specific alterations, and track hould the STL file format any rotations or translations continue to be the performed when preparing the standard for additive? AM build, conveying these to the CAM engineer; for example, for It is indeed interesting to note that post-print CNC or CMM steps. STL files are still used a lot in our industry. This is most probably There are over 50 metal 3D because of the solid format, printing OEMs active in the where few things can go wrong. market today. Which technology As long as one wants to exchange do you see as being the leader in geometrical information for that sector over the next decade, printing, STL suffices. and what will drive that? Still, we believe that it makes a lot of sense to enrich the STL There are many metal 3D mesh information. This is why printing OEMs active, using Materialise has been playing a several different technologies: leading role in recent years in the binder jetting, laser powder bed definition and development of the fusion, electron beam powder bed 3MF file format. fusion, direct energy deposition, While still being a mesh to name a few. representation of the parts, 3MF We believe that each of these stands for a seriously enriched technologies has its own merits format that contains much more and will have its own market information on the actual part position. So, we don’t want to than just the geometrical part put one or the other technology description. forward as the leader. Also, parametric CAD formats We’d rather believe that the are gaining importance. Not just current drive by the OEMs to make metal 3D printers better performing; to increase the size and complexity of components that can be printed; to expand 3MF stands for a seriously enriched the choice of metals; and to the repeatability and format that contains improve predictability of the output, will much more than just mean that metal 3D printing will the geometrical part thrive in the next decade and will be used on a much larger scale in description the industry.

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materialise.com

CHRISTOPH ERHARDT METAL 3DP MANUFACTURING MANAGER PROTOLABS

manufacturing sector imaginable a high repeatability that is at least comparable to a classic CNC machine. What does the additive industry really need in order to step up to production-grade levels?

epeatability – between machines and even between batches – is a huge problem, especially in metals AM. What might be done to solve this? Firstly, we are qualifying parts on a dedicated system, so we don’t switch parts between, for example, an EOS and a Concept Laser System. Once we’ve defined a system, we qualify a certain material with

We know that we can deliver parts that meet all production requirements when it comes to mechanical properties and accuracy. However, where we have traditionally struggled is when we talk to customers about higher quantities (in multiples of thousands) and being able to meet their pricing requirements. It works in different fields when we have extremely complex parts or we’re talking about a high variety of components – medical being a prime example.

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We are focusing on speeding-up the process with machines or enhancing the complete process to encompass automation

 our printing parameters to be as robust as possible. This means we can achieve the same mechanical properties and accuracy over the complete build. The last stage would be a defined build orientation, which leads to optimum part quality and covers surface roughness and detail resolution, for instance. With these three topics in mind – qualified machine, qualified printing parameter and locked build orientation – we are able to offer customers from every

For simple standard parts, it is often too expensive, compared to traditional manufacturing methods, and we need to explore new technologies and ways in which we can reduce the cost. With this in mind, we are focusing on speeding up the process with machines (multi-laser/automatisation) or enhancing the complete process to encompass automated finishing and improved build preparation. protolabs.com

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3D printing at an industrial scale, despite the hype, is still in its infancy. We asked six industry experts for their thoughts on what’s holding back uptake, and what needs to happen to put additive manufacturing on a par with other manufacturing methods

BEN SCHRAUWEN CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICER OQTON

SHAI TEREM CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER MARKFORGED

sintering will probably become the dominant technology.

parts from China or the CNC shop a few states over, it’s clear that additive is part of the strategy for the most successful manufacturers.

What does the additive industry really need to step up to production-grade levels?

here are over 50 metal 3D printing OEMs active in the market – which technology do you see as being the leader over the next decade, and what will drive that? Laser melting will probably still remain the workhorse whenever high-precision, bio-compatibility or superior surface finish is required. For parts with less stringent tolerance constraints, or ones that will be post-machined, a binder-based process with post-

On the hardware front, prices of machines and materials need to keep coming down, and precise control of the complete process is key to improving reliability and reproducibility – the main drivers in a production set-up. Furthermore, a software platform focused on production, such as Oqton FactoryOS, can significantly improve the utilisation of equipment and reduce engineering costs and mistakes, thanks to its AIassisted workflow automation. We have seen up to 50% reductions in part cost, purely from using an integrated production software platform. oqton.com

Repeatability – between machines and even batches – is a huge problem, especially in metals. How might this be solved?

ovid-19 has shown how fragile global supply chains can be. Is additive making inroads into reshoring manufacturing? What will it take to make this happen?

To me, this comes down to three steps: Step 1: Regardless of what kind of printer you are using, you need to design for the process. Learning how to design is such an important first step. The pandemic has proved Step 2: Test, test and test again. that additive manufacturing AM manufacturers need to must play an important role sweat the printing details, so our for manufacturers that hope customers can focus on running to thrive during periods of their operations. We obsess uncertainty. over reliability to make sure our As we saw manufacturing machines run the same way activity plunge, 3D printing every time under the rigorous levels recovered much faster than challenges of a factory floor. other means. Step 3: Bring in the power In the beginning, there were big of smart technology. Sensors drops as we saw Europe and Asia and software can help to make go into full lockdown, but then printers smarter and capable of we saw a quick bounce-back, with self-correction. stories of customers bringing For example, we’ve baked printers home and figuring out automatic calibration into our how to return to essential work. printers by combining software By using additive with scanners, allowing users to manufacturing, manufacturers quickly and easily check if a part were able to rapidly engineer is within tolerance without the solutions that shortened their need for additional clunky and response time to problems. expensive equipment. As international supply chains markforged.com continue to strain while we battle the virus, we’re seeing manufacturers want more The pandemic has control over their supply proved that additive chains. They’re not necessarily manufacturing must reshoring their entire supply chains, but they are looking play an important for ways to make those supply role chains more resilient. Whether they’re sourcing

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OPINION

YANN RAGEUL EMEA HEAD OF MANUFACTURING STRATASYS

manufacturing was accelerating even before COVID-19 arrived, but the disruption caused by the pandemic has made the technology’s benefits even clearer. This was evidenced in the way Paris hospitals invested in 60 Stratasys 3D printers to create spare parts in-house; automakers were using 3D printing to re-tool production hould the STL file format lines quickly to assemble continue to be the ventilators; and scores of standard for additive? organisations around the world were helping meet urgent The STL file is an increasingly needs for things like PPE by dated file format that costs you putting spare 3D printing colour, resolution and especially, capacity to work. time. Manufacturers recognise that Increasingly sophisticated 3D the next disruption – be it from printers can take advantage of a climate change, competition, or lot more information than that. trade war – is inevitable, and they The right solution is 3MF. want to be able to better manage This XML-based open-standard uncertainty. data format is kind of like The agility and efficiency of next-gen STL. It holds all the additive manufacturing, when information – not just surfaces, combined with continued but also textures, materials, technological innovation, is colours and mesh. already helping move it out of the Plus, it is increasingly lab and onto the factory floor. supported by leading applications In fact, our estimates are that like Luxion Keyshot and the manufacturing segment Solidworks. of the 3D printing market will It makes it much faster and exceed $25 billion by 2025, up easier to get the most out of from less than $3 billion in 2015. multi-colour, multi-material 3D To achieve this growth, printers. a combination of highperformance hardware that How long until AM rises offers repeatability, accuracy out of Gartner’s Trough of and reliability and connectivity Disillusionment on the Hype for a fully digitalised inventory Cycle – and what will it take? will be key. Momentum for additive stratasys.com

DUANN SCOTT VP OF MARKETING NTOPOLOGY

software. So it really is a case of finding the best format for the situation. Unfortunately, we do still have some customers whose machines only accept STL, so of course we support the format, but we would really like to use another format wherever possible.

hould the STL file format continue to be the standard for additive?

At nTopology, we are very much advocates of using the best data communication for a given situation. We do not believe there is one file format that covers every requirement, especially not STL. We are focusing on using the 3MF file format and adoption of extensions like the Beam Lattice and are very interested in the Volumetric extension to get more information than just geometry to machines. We also have a lot of customers that export slice stacks direct from nTop to their build preparation

There are over 50 metal 3D printing OEMs active in the market – which technology do you see as being the leader over the next decade, and what will drive that? We expect to see some level of consolidation with mergers and acquisitions in the metal AM market in the coming years. I also expect there to be more specialisation of machines optimised for serial production for specific products, like a medical device unit with low Z-height and faster build plate changeover, and more hybrid DED systems with adaptive toolpathing and secondary machining functions on very large parts for aerospace. ntopology.com

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We are focusing on using the 3MF file format and adoption of extensions like the Beam Lattice and are very interested in the Volumetric extension to get more information than just geometry to machines

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Manufacturers recognise that the next disruption – be it from climate change, competition, or trade wars – is inevitable, and they want to be able to better manage uncertainty

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OVERVIEW

FULL COLOUR NAE BOTHER NAE BOTHER » One of the biggest 3D printing vendors has teamed up with one of the most popular visualisation tools to help colour 3D printing finally deliver on its promises. Stephen Holmes takes a look at the Stratasys/Keyshot partnership

ull-colour 3D printing has more often than not failed to live up to its hype. Designers have regarded it as an expensive folly, one that creates overly expensive, hard-to-print parts they wouldn’t put in front of their grandmothers, let alone a client. Even Stratasys’ Polyjet technology – capable of producing thousands of colours, with Pantone verification and extreme detail – has had trouble expanding the market, because of the nightmare workflow involved in applying true colours to solid 3D CAD models. Until now, that is. November 2020 sees Stratasys officially launch its partnership with visualisation experts Luxion and its software Keyshot to create a new workflow that exports print-ready 3MF files. Keyshot is the magic ingredient in all this: While the 3MF file allows the export of the geometry, colour and bump map data in a neat package, it’s the visualisation software that unwraps the model, automates the process and creates a useable workflow. The goal of this is to create synergy between the concept on screen and a physical model, allowing for Colour Material Finish (CMF) prototypes to be produced quickly in bunches for decision-making, integrating it into the wider workflow much earlier than usual. “For both KeyShot and Stratasys, it’s all about a single question: How can we get the designer to that ‘Yes’ moment faster?” says Luxion VP of product Derek Cicero. “The more you can visualise around colours, materials and finish, and the sooner you can do it, the more confidence a designer has that they made the right choices.” In KeyShot, this is about getting from a CAD model into experimentation with CMF in a few clicks to see what works, and then exporting it via renders and animations. “The decision-making process is hyper-streamlined,” explains Cicero. “It’s what has made KeyShot a major tool for designers for 10 years.” He continues: “When you add the ability to have ‘same-day’ physical samples that reflect those colours and finishes, you now have the ability to build out and refine an entire product go-to-market: the marketing shots, the website, the packaging and the ‘physical product’, before you manufacture a ‘real’ prototype.”

Previous attempts to solve the pipeline problem through a partnership with Adobe failed, primarily because the file sizes it created were unusably large. It’s unsurprising then that CMF prototypes remain towards the end of the design workflow, long after geometry and functional prototypes and other key decisions have been decided through on-screen tools. While a colour or material change is easy to action in a render, it can be much more effort to change in a physical prototype. “That’s the difference between a $5 and a $500 prototype!” Elgali laughs. “Testing out two different pieces of wood means sourcing another wood, or printing another vinyl wrap.” The speed of the J55 3D printing workflow now means that there is a true alternative: being able to pick out a selection of woodgrains in a design meeting, and the next morning having four physical prototypes to pick up, hold and examine, pushing CMF decisions earlier into the product development. From the initial beta rollout, Stratasys says it saw customers printing “a lot more parts”, primarily because they were accustomed to the Keyshot workflow. “It makes so much sense: I already have the CMF data [in Keyshot]. I don’t need to recreate it!” says Elgali. Yet as you would expect, not every material can be replicated through Polyjet 3D printing. Some transparency settings, metallics and mirror finishes found in Keyshot are beyond the capabilities of the hardware at present. “Of course, it will depend on what you are trying to accomplish,” says Cicero, adding that with product examples such as Priority Design’s wireless speaker [see images] or a phone case, you can get incredibly accurate results, “so that people would do a double-take if you replaced the ‘real’ version with the 3D-printed one.” “While you aren’t going to get the smoothness of leather or wood grain, you are going to get a very accurate look for decision-making purposes. For prints that are doing plastics, it’s going to be very close to the real output.”

MADE PHYSICAL “Since the J750 came out, we’ve been able to print complex geometries with colours, materials and finishes, but it was always too complicated. You would need to know 3dsMax, and ZBrush and Rhino to do it. The files were huge, would crash computers,” admits Stratasys product manager Lior Elgali, the man who has produced some of the outstanding full-colour models that Stratasys uses to showcase the capabilities of its hardware to potential customers.

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FAST PROGRESS The improvements achieved via beta testing were considerable, and both parties assures us their efforts won’t end there. As with Stratasys’ prior work providing colourcorrect Pantone verification, its team is hard at work adding multi-materials ability to the J55 platform. The addition of the Stratasys Agilus flexible material and the snap-fit, heat-resistant Digital ABS, when supported by the 3MF file, will allow shore hardness to be applied to models, as well as all the colour, geometry and texture – meaning even greater potential for early CMF models. “In utilising the 3MF format, we’re pushing to get the screen and print experience to be as closely aligned as possible. However, these will always be complimentary tools,” says Cicero. “Whereas KeyShot can give you accurate lighting of a coloured metal finish in a store environment with IES lights, the ‘correct’ height for a button on a game controller needs to be tactile.” Yet given this is just the first release of Keyshot featuring export to the J55 3D printer, Cicero is positive about where this is all heading, concluding that, “It’s possible to envision that in five or six years, we will be at a point where many 3D-printed products are indiscernible from their manufactured counterpart.”

THE REALITY The design team at Priority Designs, based in Columbus, Ohio, was a key participant in the beta testing process, putting the J55 through its paces and fitting the 3D printer into a workflow that already included Keyshot. The process, says senior industrial designer Ryan Berger, allows the Priority Design team to do a lot of exciting things with CMF that previously they’d been unable to integrate earlier into the development.

“Instead of looking at a wall full of flat renderings, we’re able to pick up and experience the product in a physical way. I think that’s its biggest value,” says Berger. In terms of workflow, Keyshot is the element that has allowed Berger to get the most from the J55 machine in terms of experimentation. “Just the ability to quickly represent the textures in a way that’s upfront, before you’ve got to make the [time] investment in CAD [is valuable],” he explains. To test out the concept, the team produced versions of the speaker in a wide variety of materials, fitting five speaker units onto the J55’s build tray at a time. The parts impressed the design team, and the more they used this process, the more new uses they found for it – including being able to simply represent displays on prototypes in a convincing way, thanks to the high resolution. “There were a lot of people in the building that had the same feeling about a colour machine: ‘Why would we ever use that?’” says Berger. “The finish, certainly, is great. It has none of that sort of powdery look that we’ve experienced with other machines. “I think it’s a big step forward and has done a great job of winning over our design staff with these prototypes. You need to get it in someone’s hands before they really understand, and then when they do, they start to think of all kinds of ways to utilise the machine.” It’s not an exact one-to-one match, he says, “but it’s close enough that I’m excited about showing these models to my clients.” Berger concludes: “It’s a great tool that adds to the ability to create something that’s so close to convincing that you eliminate some of the questions and can just focus on the design.” keyshot.com | stratasys.com

1 Capable of ●

replicating a variety of materials, the Stratasys J55 3D printer has a natural home in CMF workflows 2 A rotating ●

build platform, air filtration system and low db means the J55 can be positioned closer to the design team 3 Materials and ●

textures can be applied as usual in Keyshot, with the results now able to be exported as 3MF files 4 The colour and ●

bump map data is transferred within the 3MF file, meaning the user only has to position the part in GrabCAD Print 5 The resulting ●

models give designers the ability to pick-up and even try on a variety of concepts much earlier in the design process

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WORKING FROM HOME

DESIGNING » How has the team at Luma-ID, a specialist design and manufacturing consultancy based in Greenwich, London, adjusted to new ways of working triggered by Covid-19? Glen Sheehan talks to the team

n the mass shift to working from home triggered by the arrival of Covid-19, businesses in all sectors have had to adapt to new ways of working. Most have faced challenges along the way, not least companies in the product design field. Take, for example, Luma-ID, a specialist design and manufacturing consultancy based in Greenwich, London. As Hans Ramzan, a product designer at the firm puts it: “It’s a lot easier to collaborate with other designers in the studio. Team projects are a bit easier to work on in a studio environment, especially when it comes to building prototypes and the making of products.” Luma-ID specialises in working with entrepreneurs, inventors and businesses of all sizes to nurture product development from conception through to manufacturing. This involves organic modelling, mechanical design and 3D print prototyping and extends into developing business models and marketing strategies. As a small business focused on analysing and building early-stage designs and prototypes and thus reliant on a good deal of physical input, the Coronavirus outbreak has clearly posed challenges for Luma-ID. But thanks to in-house fast-thinking, of the kind that is usually deployed on finding solutions to complex customer design issues, the team at the firm has been remarkably

1 quick to adapt to the new working landscape. “My communication and organisation has improved during this period of working from home,” says the company’s product design manager, Matt Passmore. “Because I’m not able to turn around and ask someone else, I have to make a point of booking time with somebody, whether that’s on a call or making a task specifically for someone to do in our project management system.” It’s a sentiment shared across the team, with Ramzan taking on more responsibility to resolve issues without seeking help from colleagues: “Because I know how much more effort it is to ask for help from someone, I’ll now easily work it out myself. Your knowledge is expanded a lot more, rather than have someone do something for you.”

1 The LUMA team ●

together in their London studio, overlooking the river Thames

NEW PROBLEMS, NEW SOLUTIONS Switching to this new work culture has proved much easier, thanks to the flexibility already offered to the Luma-ID team by the company’s management. While some projects can be pressurised and deadlineintensive, when it comes to the demands of work, coowners Mark Little and Luke Vos already had in place a modern approach to their working set-up, with working from home always an option available to the team. “Mark’s been good with us, so we can start earlier or later if needed and work around the non-working day,” says product designer Alex Fleming. “Working from home

WORKING FR

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G A FUTURE 2

offers more flexibility and the workspace I have in my shed into the studio to carry out essential project work. allows me to keep hands-on involvement.” At the same time, a 3D printer has now been assigned Much of the early-stage development is done using Luma- to each member of the team, enabling everyone to work ID’s range of 3D printers with printing partners such on physical prototypes at home, while communicating via as 3DPrintUK, which offers SLS, SLA, Polyjet and FDM phone, email, Slack and video conferences where needed. capabilities. These prove invaluable for producing robust Despite the rather strange and unexpected events thrown early-stage models up by 2020 so far, that help clients Luma-ID continues to understand the to thrive, using Because I know how much more effort it is to ask its solution-based range of features for help from someone, I’ll now easily work it out approach to and benefits that could be possible myself. Your knowledge is expanded a lot more, transform working with the finished while rather than have someone do something for you methods, product. It’s a maintaining the more cost-effective high standards method of working expected by clients. that means that clients can trial and test new ideas without The company seems more than prepared for the investing too heavily in products at an early stage. uncertainty created by future local lockdowns and working Both Ramzan and Fleming live a short distance away from restrictions and well-positioned to tackle any unforeseen the Thames-facing studio. During the early stages of the challenges that may arrive in 2021. pandemic, that proximity enabled them to occasionally pop luma-id.co.uk

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2 The team always ●

makes time for weekly catch-ups 3 Hans Ramzan, ●

senior product designer at LumaID, working on a prototype that’s hot off the printer 4 Director and co●

founder Mark Little, inside his purposebuilt home workshop. (aka The Project Shed) 5 Working from ●

home is no issue for product design manager Matt Passmore, with a set-up like this in his garage (which can still accommodate both a car and his motorbike)

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REVIEWS

HARDWARE REVIEW

Formlabs Form 3 Formlabs continues to drive desktop SLA forwards, with the introduction of a new approach called Low Force Stereolithography in its new Form 3 machine. Al Dean reports on his findings TECH-SPECS » Formlabs Form 3 » UV curable resins » 145 x 145 x 185 mm build volume » 405 x 375 x 530 mm machine dimensions » 17.5 kg weight » 0.025 to 0.2 mm layers with 0.085 mm spot size » WiFi, LAN, USB port » Assisted levelling, sensing for resin cartridges & build tanks » Remotely manageable build queue

ack in 2012, Formlabs took the 3D printing world by storm with a crowdfunding campaign on Kickstarter that raised almost $3 million, making it the most highly funded project on that platform, at that time. The start-up’s impressive reworking of stereolithography (SLA) brought this process to the desktop for the first time, making it more accessible, in terms of both device size and price. The new Form 3 from Formlabs drives desktop SLA forwards yet again, introducing a new approach that the company has trademarked as Low Force Stereolithography, or LFS. To understand what this means, you need to understand what the Formlabs Form 3 replaces. Basically, its predecessors – the Form 1/1+, and Form 2 machines – are inverted SLA machines, where the optics, lasers and so on are located below the build tank, rather than above it, as with more traditional SLA machines. During a build, the build platform moves incrementally upwards as each layer is built below, in a tank of UV curable resin. For this arrangement to work, the base of the build tank is transparent and

» 1-year return to base warranty » Optional Wash & Cure devices @ £1,070 » Price £3,349 » formlabs.com

The Form 3 follows the styling conventions of the previous units, but brings a brand-new take on the SLA build process to market

the light cures the resin held between the build platform and that transparent base, at the required layer thickness. The issue here is that, once a layer is complete, you have a rigid build platform, liquid resin and a set of cured geometry, all within 0.2mm of a typically rigid glass or plastic window. To add the next layer height, the platform needs to move upwards, but this causes suction between the part on the build platform and the window below. That force, although small, can impact build consistency, even snapping the part mid-build. It can also impact the resin tank’s integrity, as it repeats once every few seconds and potentially thousands of times per build. There are several ways to get around this issue. The most common way is for the build tank to tilt away from the part, in order to break the suction. This is what the Form 1 did (the Form 2 adds a sliding action), in common with almost every other desktop SLA machine. But it’s also the reason why there are limits on what it’s possible to achieve with desktop, inverted SLA machines, in terms of geometry and size of parts and the speed of the systems themselves. With the Form 3, the new LFS process looks to solve some of these challenges with two key pieces of technology. The first is a new optics arrangement; rather than a single fixed unit that emits light from a fixed position mirror, a new light processing unit slides back and forth beneath the build tank, delivering the UV light spot exactly where it’s needed. This unit interacts with the second piece of technology – a new flexible, transparent window in the resin tank. Essentially, the moving optics unit only applies pressure upwards to create the layer thickness when and where it is building, so the suction between the built material, the build platform and the resin are broken incrementally, rather than at the end of each layer. So if Formlabs has overcome this problem, what are the benefits you might expect to see? For a start, you’ll be able to build parts with fewer supports needed to keep the part on the build platform – and that means better surface finish and less post-processing work. That’s huge news for those working with SLA, where a single build material means that time saved on the build itself is often offset by the time subsequently spent on post-processing tasks. Conversely, if you’ve reduced the force, it also means when it comes to heavier, larger parts, you’re able to better support the part in the build process, perhaps using more supports, but supports that have less impact on surface finish. Finally, if you’re moving the optics close to the point of build consistently, then you’re better managing the accuracy of each spot and hence the accuracy of the parts. The outer limits of the build chamber in particular, should be more consistent.

MACHINE SET-UP Set-up involves exactly what we’ve come to expect from Formlabs: well-packaged machines, clear instructions and a pretty trouble-free process. Once the machine is unpacked, set up with power, connected to your network and your build platform is in place, you’ll need to add in some key components. The first is the build platform, which is dead simple. Then you’ll need to add the build tank and the stirring device that snaps into place. Once that’s done, you can add in the resin 40 NOVEMBER 2020 DEVELOP3D.COM

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HARDWARE REVIEW cartridge by slotting it into the back of the machine, making sure you keep the small cap that’s found over the dispensing valve, as this will come in handy later. One point to note is that these parts all have their own ID chips in place, so if you get an error, remove and try again. This usually fixes things nicely. Thanks to these chips, the machine ‘knows’ which tanks and resins you’ve inserted. So the first time that you combine a resin cartridge with a build tank, it links them in the software and records how much resin is dispensed and how much the resin tank is used. (We’ll get on to why that’s important in a little while.) Now that the machine is ready, you’ll need to prepare some parts for building.

PREFORM SOFTWARE I want to discuss the software environment for Formlabs in more depth further on, but the initial step is to download and install PreForm, the company’s pre-processing software. Connect this to the machine you’ve just set up and you’re ready to get a part in and arrange it correctly. Here, you have a wealth of tools available, from STL fixing to auto-orientation. PreForm has always been impressive, and the latest version, in combination with this machine, is excellent. You’ll need to define the layer size you’re building with, as this can influence support generation. While most 3D printers have fixed layer sizes that can be varied, Formlabs’ ecosystem means that the software knows the best range of settings for the resin you have loaded into the machine. Depending on the resin, layers can vary from 0.05mm (which is pretty common) to 0.2mm if you’re using the new Draft resin. As ever, finer resolution means smoother surfaces, but longer build times. Alongside these overall controls, Formlabs has also been introducing adaptive layer sizing to the material definitions in PreForm. This works by taking the geometry of your build and actively looking for areas where the machine can use larger layer thicknesses without impacting surface finish. If you’re working with prismatic engineering parts, this can really save time. For example, our block model benchmark part, built using 0.025mm layers, would take 27.5 hours to complete. Changing the settings to adaptive, by contrast, would reduce this to 11 hours, with comparable results in terms of surface finish. When it comes to support generation, PreForm does a decent job, particularly given the new approach made possible with the new build process. The software gives you feedback about where you should add supports, allows you to remove them, indicates printability and identifies any areas that run the risk of suffering from ‘cupping’. (Cupping is what happens when specific geometry conditions during a build cause additional suction between the built part and the build tank.) There are a ton of other options for things like labelling on the base of the part,

1 optimising the position of parts and more. Time spent exploring PreForm’s options will pay real dividends in terms of results, and save you considerable time and materials. Once you’ve got your build ready, you’ll need to send it to the machine. In most instances, this will mean transferring the build job over the network to the machine, loading it from the on-machine touchscreen and starting the build. If your facility keeps 3D printer technologies away from the design office, then the new Prime option is worth exploring; this means that, when one job is finished, you can prepare the machine for the next job (by clearing the build platform and ensuring the material is loaded and ready to go). You’ll then be able to save yourself a trip back to the machine, by enabling it to start automatically.

data on a job-by-job basis, too, with quick thumbnail previews of each build. It’s worth noting, however, that actual geometry is not stored.

POST-PROCESSING This was the first time that I’ve had access to the Wash and Cure devices that accompany Formlabs’s machines. Whereas the standard offering is a set of post-processing tools that involve a lot of manual work, the Wash and Cure sets are designed to automate a lot of the work needed on your part once its build has completed. The first step is to wash away any excess resin from the model. The Wash device is a part washer, into which you load either the complete build platform or just parts. You set the time for a washing cycle and the machine takes the part into

1 The Form 3 3D ●

printer alongside the Wash (middle) and Cure (left) postprocessing devices 2 The Form 3 has ●

a generous build volume allowing for some pretty full build envelopes

SOFTWARE PLATFORM While the machine is building, let’s now turn our attention to the software platform that comes with Formlabs machines these days. The Formlabs Dashboard Platform is cloudbased and makes it possible to manage multiple Formlabs machines simultaneously, including their respective build jobs, resins and build tanks. In the context of the Form 3, this is where you’re able to look into how your machines are being used, how much material you have remaining in each cartridge, the remaining lifespan of your build tanks and more. If you’re also using Form 2 machines, you’re able to look into heat maps for each build tank, to find out where best to position your parts and when tanks need to be replaced. In terms of analytics, you’re also able to very quickly pull up a job history and export it as a spreadsheet – ideal for accounting and for auditing purposes. Want to know how much prototypes for a particular project cost or how much your company spent on particular resins over a year? This information is readily available in a centralised location. You can inspect the

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a bath of either isopropyl alcohol (IPA) or Tripropylene glycol monomethyl ether (TPM), which is not as effective, but has similar properties without the smell or flammability of IPA. It then spins it up to wash away any excess resin. The amount of time needed to perform this task depends on both the resin being used (the Formlabs support site gives you a quick look-up table for recommendations) and the geometry of your part (more complex geometry typically needs more time to wash out, particularly parts with fine detail and/or more complex internal structures.) Once that’s done, the part raises up again, drains back into the tank and you’re ready to dry it off before curing. As we’ve discussed, the Form 3 uses UV-curable resins to build its parts, but the curing process is only sufficient to get you a part out of the machine. To achieve the best mechanical results, you’ll need to post-cure the parts, too. This is where the Cure device comes in. The curing of Formlabs resins involves two factors: heating the part and further exposure to UV light. Again, a look-up table gives you rough estimates. These are programmed into the device, the part is added, the door closed and the machine started. The Cure device will then heat up and light up your part, rotating it on the internal turntable and giving a chirpy little beep when it is done.

IN CONCLUSION The Form 3 is an excellent evolution of what Formlabs has been delivering all along; that is to say, desktop SLA units that take the heavy lifting away from the user and let them carry on with the real work of design and engineering, rather than fannying around with 3D printer settings. The desktop SLA market is one that’s very much saturated at the low end and while I’m sure you can get decent results out of some of these machines, I know from experience that this often means a lot of tinkering and maintenance. The big question, then, is whether this is a valuable use of your time. Formlabs has built a solid ecosystem around its machines, one that brings together world-class hardware, an excellent software backbone for using and managing printers, and a growing range of materials. These include volumeuse engineering resins for a range of applications and use cases and more speciality resins for specific tasks: casting, dental, biocompatible and so on. In use, the combination of the Form 3 alongside the Wash and Cure set is excellent and gets you a workable part in the shortest time possible. It also takes a lot of the guesswork out of the process. If your organisation is looking at high cycles of parts, then I would suggest investing in an additional build platform as a minimum. In terms of consumables, things get interesting with the new build tanks. Here, there isn’t as much degradation as you’d

4 expect to see with each build on a Form 1 or a Form 2 machine, due to the different build process. At the same time, with that flexible base, you really don’t want to run this up to the wire in terms of usability. Fortunately, the software monitors each tank and provides you with a health mark. My firm advice here would be not to ignore or dismiss what that health mark tells you. In terms of materials, we worked with the Flexible, Tough 1500 and Grey Pro resins. The Grey Pro resin is incredible in terms of the quality of surface finish and the lightness of touch between the supports needed and your part. It excels at both and lightweight supports mean that even the B-sides of your part don’t need too much finishing. The Tough Resin is an evolution of Formlabs’ original tough resin and the company offers a variety of these now for more demanding applications. Resulting parts are robust, but do seem to require a heavy support structure. The Flexible resin arguably involved the steepest learning curve. If your parts are not too complex, it’ll be fine – but once you venture into the realms of parts that require internal support structures, things can get a little more hit-or-miss.

One thing we did struggle with was testing this in the height of British summer. Our workshops are not air-conditioned, and if you’re working with these devices in temperatures of 35C to 40C, you may find you’re exceeding the operating temperature of the resin. We experienced a few print failures until we figured out what was going on. That said, other than those three days of sweltering heatwave, the machine performed robustly and consistently. The combination of the Wash and Cure units make the process even more efficient and everything we built was impressive from beginning to end. If you’re looking for a desktop SLA machine for in-house prototyping, or indeed end-use part manufacture, then the Form 3 has to be at the top of your list. Yes, there are more cost-effective options out there, on paper at least, but the robustness of these machines, the ecosystem in which they operate, the materials available and the development work done to make using them more efficient means that your additional investment gets paid back in no time at all. We can’t wait to see what Formlabs comes up with next. formlabs.com

3 Formlabs PreForm ●

gives you all the controls you need to build your parts as efficiently as possible 4 The Formlabs ●

Dashboard Platform extends PreForm to give you a cloudbased environment in which to manage, audit and control your Formlabs machines and material use

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HARDWARE REVIEW

Raise3D E2 Raise3D has built its reputation on high-quality, larger capacity desktop filament machines. With two independent extruders supporting some interesting workflows, the new E2 looks set to extend the company’s solid track record, as Al Dean reports

TECH-SPECS » Raise E2 » 1.75mm filament » 330x240x240 mm build volume » 607x596x465mm machine dimensions » 35kg weight » 0.02 to 0.25 mm layers » Independent extruders with heated build plate » WiFi, LAN, USB port & live camera » HEPA filter with activated charcoal » Active levelling & filament fault sensing » 1-year return to base warranty » Price £2,749 » raise3D.com | 3dgbire.com

1 Raise3D’s E2 ●

includes dual spools feeding independent extruders in its robust build envelope

decade or so on from its initial explosion, the desktop filament-based 3D printer market is still going strong. While unit sales may have slowed since that early peak, there’s been no slacking in the number of new manufacturers or machines entering the market. For buyers, the upshot is that, regardless of budget, they can find a machine that will let them build parts from spools of plastic filament, right there on the desktop. And that’s true whether they spend £100 on an open-frame machine, or thousands on a fully enclosed, fully automated device. Based in China, with marketing activities based in the US, Raise3D has built a reputation on offering larger capacity machines with an enclosed build environment and smart sensors to help with tasks such as bed levelling and filament control. On loan to us from the folks at 3DGBire, its latest E2 machine continues the trend, but comes with some fancy new tricks up its sleeve.

GETTING READY TO PRINT The E2 is an impressively robust unit. It weighs in at 35kg, so while one person may be able to lift it, two might be better. Once out of the box, it’s time to set it up and get ready to print. As you can see from the images, a vertical hinge-front door gives access to the build plate, but there’s also a top-hinged lid, too. To the left and right, you’ll see the filament bays and two extruders. Set-up is pretty easy: unpack the unit, plug it in, then follow the instructions shown on the built-in LCD touchscreen on the front of the machine. Connectivity is via WiFi, Ethernet or USB and there’s an on-board camera for monitoring your build. You can also opt to connect the machine to Raise3D’s RaiseCloud service. This provides access to machine monitoring without access to the physical network. In terms of calibration, the E2’s marketing materials make a fair bit of noise about what they describe as the “world’s first videoassisted calibration”. The reality is that the touchscreen displays explanatory videos to

guide you through the process. It’s a nice use of the display, certainly, but it may be a bit of a stretch to call it “video-assisted”. That said, the vital step of calibration on this machine is performed easily enough. Before we get on to the ins and outs of actually building parts, we need first to discuss the configuration of the mechanism inside the machine, and specifically, its extruders. The E2 uses a technology that Raise3D calls IDEX, or independent extruders. Dual-extruder machines are commonplace enough, but whereas most typically offer a single carriage featuring two extruders, the E2’s two build nozzles are able to move independently on the X-axis – but only the X axis. So what does this mean in reality? The answer is, it depends on what you’re building. If you’re running with a singlebuild material and a support or, indeed, two build materials, then the difference is negligible. The machine builds with one extruder, then switches to the other, just as other dual extruder machines do.

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at Laser Lines Ltd Laser Lines Ltd offers the full range of Formlabs 3D printers - all backed by our highly experienced Technical Support team. Visit our new demonstration suite where we can take you through the many advantages offered by the Form 3 range of printers. See how the Wash and Cure systems operate, and handle models built with the ever-increasing range of resins now available. We also carry an extensive stock of materials for the Form 3 printers - ready to ship on order! Form 3 Flawless Prints, Every Time Scale prototyping and production as your business grows with the Form 3, an affordable, industrial-quality 3D printer that consistently delivers.

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It’s when you activate duplicate or mirror mode that things start to get interesting. Since the extruders are two separate units on the same X axis, if you want to build with both at the same time, then you need to have toolpaths that can drive all of the axes in the same motion, at same time, hence duplicate and mirror modes. Duplicate mode forces the right extruder to replicate the movement of the left, but offset on the right-hand side of the build plate. If you’re familiar with a pantograph, it’s the same principle. In terms of usefulness, if you’re looking to build duplicates of the same part, then you can effectively split the job across the central line and have both extruders working in unison, effectively halving production time. This is pretty easy to set up. Switching the set-up software into duplicate mode splits the virtual build platform and anything you do on the left side gets copied across the centre plane. It allows you to work with different coloured materials, too. Note that while you can vary colour, you need to have matching build parameters between the two materials. Mirror mode works in much the same way, but it mirrors the part across the central plane automatically. This mode may not be as useful as duplicate mode, but if you’re building handed prototypes, or indeed, enduse parts, it could save you a bunch of time in set-up and build. Imagine a set of jigs for a production run being built at the same time, with no pre-processing needed in your CAD system. You just model up one set, export, and then let the system build you the other set automatically.

Now that we’ve got our heads around the different build capabilities, let’s dig down into what it’s like to work with the E2.

BUILD PROCESS The set-up software for the E2 is pretty nice, particularly when compared to some lower-end machines we’ve looked at recently. It’s clear what you’re doing. The software gives you access to presets initially, but if you want to dig in, tweak settings, or bring in more complex materials (the E2 supports materials that build up to 300C so there are plenty of options), you can do those things, too. If you want to activate the build modes (duplicate and mirror), the system guides you through the steps required to make the most of these capabilities. Materials, meanwhile, are held in two closed-off bays on either side of the unit. That means you’ll need a bit of space around the machine in order to open them. Material loading is pretty simple: open the door and feed the filament (the unit uses widely available 1.75mm filament) into the Bowden tube till it reaches the extruder. Then, choose your material from presets or define a melt temp and start the loading process. Again, you’re guided through the whole process using on-screen videos. Once done, you’re ready to begin calibration. It’s worth noting that if you’re using both extruders extensively, then

we found that you really need to pay close attention to calibration and bed measurement. The E2’s build plate is removable, which in turn makes removal of parts simple, but it also means that every time you replace the build plate, you run the risk of knocking it out of calibration. As a result, you need to take care positioning the build plate and running the auto-level routine each time. If you’re simply re-running a previous job, then you can probably get away with a quick and simple calibration, but if you’re using the right nozzle extensively, perhaps building a part with multiple materials or using the duplicate/mirror modes, we found it best to run the full levelling and left-nozzle calibration routines. That extra ten minutes you spend make the odds of a successful print much higher. The system is then left to work. The E2 has some useful features that will give you more confidence when running jobs overnight or otherwise leaving the machine unattended. First, an on-board camera is available for

2 Raise3D’s E2 ●

includes dual independent extruders 3 Two sets of parts, ●

built in two colours at the same time 4 Parts off the E2 ●

did well under the calipers, with only a 0.2mm deviation at most in Z direction 5 As with all dual●

material processes, the build takes longer, as the system needs to switch extruders where needed, potentially on every layer 6 With care, decent ●

dual-material results can be achieved

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HARDWARE REVIEW monitoring while on the same network, but also further afield if you take advantage of the RaiseCloud platform for monitoring. In addition, there are filament detection sensors that will pause your print if it runs into trouble, as well as a poweroutage resuming capability. So should you experience a power cut, the machine should get back to work on the job without too many problems once power is restored. Once your build is complete, it’s time to remove the part from the build plate. As we’ve already said, the build plate is magnetically attached in place. It’s also made of flexible spring steel with a Buildtak surface applied. This means that, with a quick bend, most parts will pop right off. If they’re a little more resistant, a gentle tickle with the supplied spatula usually suffices. Give the build plate a quick clean-up and pop it back into place and it’s ready to go again, while you post-process your parts.

IN CONCLUSION This was my first hands-on experience of a Raise3D machine, and I really like the E2. Having subsequently detailed some of my findings on social media, I’ve discovered that the company has a very loyal set of followers, using its technology in lots of interesting ways. As ever, the best results come from combining familiar materials with solidly proven build parameters. The unit lends itself to consistent part quality, because the fully enclosed build environment limits internal variances and protects from the negative impact of external factors.

There are a couple of other advantages to mention here. The first is that the E2 is a very well-built unit that builds at speed, but is also very quiet, particularly compared to the Method X device we benchmarked at the same time. The other is that while there are no interlocks on the access doors, there are sensors and it’s a pretty trivial matter to have the system pause build when they’re opened. All of this makes the E2 ideal for use in an open environment, perhaps in sharedaccess spaces or in education. The material range this machine supports is pretty wide, too. As long as your material builds under 300C, then you should be OK.

That said, known materials such as PLA, ABS, ASA, Nylon and some of the more exotic filled materials should all be fine, too. There are many instances where speed of production will be a benefit, whether that’s for prototypes, assistive parts (jigs, fixtures and so on) or for end-use parts. The final question, of course, is how much will this machine cost? The answer may surprise you. It’s £2,749. I know, right? With the E2, it’s fair to say that the buyer gets an awful lot of machine for their money – and a machine that comes with some advanced capabilities thrown into the bargain, too. raise3D.com | 3dgbire.com

6 The E2 is a pretty ●

compact machine, considering the capabilities it offers. It’s also quiet, making it ideal for office use

3D PRINT BENCHMARKS: PUTTING THE RAISE3D E2 TO THE TEST SMALL BATCH COMPONENTS Test part & challenge: This is a small, basic pinion gear, the type of thing that might be required in large volumes, making it ideal for initial testing of 3D print machines. The E2 Bed could fit 40 of these in both normal and duplication mode

Material usage & Cost: 6g of filament per part

Test part & challenge: This test part is pretty self explanatory. It’s a block model to test both surface quality on more contoured forms, as well as b-side build quality when using both build material supports and dissolvable filaments (such as PVA)

Material usage & Cost: 30.9 grams of PLA build filament with 6.3g of support PVA filament per part

Test part & challenge: We like to use this full-scale, triple tree component, since it tends to push the build envelope of most 3D printers in the desktop arena. The part is large, it’s clunky and it’s also super-easy when it comes to measuring up

Material usage & Cost: 251g of PLA filament per part (including supports)

Build time: 40 units (0.2mm layers + 10% infill) in normal mode is 40 hours 8 minutes. In duplication mode, it’s 21 hours 6 minutes

Results: This is a real USP for the E2. The dual independent extruders allow production of series of single material parts in roughly 50% of the time by splitting the build chamber. It’s like having two machines working concurrently

FORM & BLOCK MODELS

Build time: Single part (0.2mm layers + 10% infill) in normal mode is 9 hours 37 minutes

Results: This worked out really nicely with the combination of PVA supports and PLA build material. A-surfaces were as you’d expect, but B-surfaces came out nicely, too. Using just build material for supports also worked OK

LARGE & CHUNKY BUILDS Build time: Single part (0.25 mm layers + 10% infill) in speed mode is 19 hours 34 minutes. Using PVA supports adds 1 hour 20 minutes

Results: Big parts always take longer, it’s a question of how long you have to wait. This part took under 20 hours, but add time for support removal. Adding in PVA supports (which adds cost and 90 minutes to the build) saves you that time, with better results

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HARDWARE REVIEW

MakerBot Method X With the Method 3D line of 3D printers, Stratasys has finally started to make clear its ownership of the MakerBot brand. From its heated build chamber to its bullet-proof accuracy, this is not the MakerBot of old, writes Al Dean TECH-SPECS » Makerbot Method X » 1.75mm proprietary filament » 152x190x196 mm (dual extrusion) or 190x190x190mm (using single extruder via Cloud Print) build volume » 437x413x649mm machine dimensions » 29.5 kg weight » 0.02 to 0.4 mm layers Dimensional accuracy stated at +/- 0.2mm » Flexible spring steel build plate » Heated build chamber » WiFi, LAN, USB port & live camera » Automatic material loading & filament sensing » Active levelling & filament fault sensing » 1 year return to base warranty » Price $6,499 / €6,499 » makerbot.com

1 Makerbot Method X ●

desktop unit including: A Ventilation grid & ●

extruder access panel B Power + USB slot ● C Touchscreen panel ● D Dual extruders ●

for build & support deposition E Heated build ●

chamber

F Flexible build plate ● G Sealed material ●

bays

he MakerBot brand has, in the modern parlance, been on something of a journey. Born out of the New York-based makerspace community back in 2009, it quickly became a poster child for the 3D printing revolution. (That said, it should be noted that the technology was actually based on research conducted by a team led by Adrian Bowyer at Bath University in the UK.) With the emergence of Makerbot, out went the old guard of expensive machines from long-established companies that protected their patents as fiercely as they did their profit margins; and in came a new breed of machine manufacturer, eager to take advantage of expiring patents and the ability to access the components required to build their own machines. A new, more democratic 3D printing industry was born. But just a few years down the line, things went awry at MakerBot. There were bitter battles between its founders, claims of ‘selling out’ and some questionable product launches. This culminated in the company’s 2013 sale to Stratasys for $604 million. The poster child had been adopted by the pioneer of fused deposition modelling (FDM); in other words, its new parent was the same company that Makerbot had originally set out to disrupt. The story hasn’t been any less complex since then, either. MakerBot’s Replicator 2 machines performed well, but advances in FDM technology have meant that open gantry machines with single extruders have become commodity items. It’s possible these days to source all manner of variants, often at very low cost. When you can buy an FDM machine at Aldi, you know the market has changed irreversibly. So the launch of the Makerbot Method series last year grabbed our attention. It was clear from the off that these machines owed more to Stratasys’ technical knowhow than predecessors. An opportunity to try out the Method X model came along, and we grabbed it, keen to see how it opens up new materials options for users and to explore the other improvements it brings.

SET UP AND BUILD The Method X is a compact machine. That said, if you’re accustomed to smaller, open frame machines, you need to be aware that while the footprint is broadly similar to that of competitors, the Method X is also tall and heavy. In fact, it’s just under 1m tall and weighs in at 30kg or so. Within that frame, it has two sealed material bays at the base of the unit, with

A C

1 a fully enclosed and heated build chamber above. Above the build chamber, you’ll find two extruders that lay down the layers of build and support filament. Set-up guidance is provided via the touchscreen on the top of the unit. Connect to WiFi or Ethernet, set up the MakerBot machine on your workstation (OSX or Windows) and connect the two. The set-up process shows you how to install the extruders in the top of the unit, your materials into the material bay and, finally, the build platform. All three tasks are simple and you are guided by the machine, step by step. Take, for example, loading materials: you tell the machine you want to load a new

spool and it walks you through opening the material bay, and loading the filament spool into the machine. It’s a simple matter of pushing the filament into the correct hold and letting the machine do the rest. There’s no need to bring extruders up to temperature, purge old material or manually feed the machine. It handles all these tasks for you, by way of a nifty loading mechanism that feeds the filament to the extruders and via instructions from RFID tags in the centre of each spool, along with the ever-present sachet of silica gel.

MATERIALS OPTIONS At this point, it’s a good time to talk about the range of materials available

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for the Method X. After all, that ‘X’ refers specifically to the machine’s ability to work with a wider range of materials than the standard Method. This will work with the likes of PLA, PETG and Nylon, and the Method X builds on this, extending into ABS, ASA and PC ABS (including a fireretardant variant of this last one). How does it achieve this? The trick lies in the heated build chamber, where heat rises to 110C (compared to 60C in the standard MakerBot Method), as well as a more robust set of extruders. Plus, for the first time, the Method X introduces the ability to print supports using Stratasys’ SR-30 support material, which has been developed to work with the more complex polymers that the Method X can handle. It’s a replacement, in effect, for Soluble PVA or similar, but offers faster dissolvability. We’ve tested out both ABS and ASA filaments combined with SR-30 supports and the results have been topnotch. Once your machine is up and running, materials loaded and your copy of Makerbot Print installed, you’re ready to go. The software enables you to read in STLs and OBJs, a good range of native and standard CAD formats and offers a wide range of tools to help you optimise your build trays, in terms of part positioning and orientation. When it comes to selecting your build parameters, the system has (for both ABS and ASA) two presets ready to go: Balanced, which gives you a quick build, with more sparse infill; and Solid, for creating much tougher parts, but which doesn’t extend the build time as much as you might imagine. (Our brake lever benchmark model, for example, took 5.5 hours in Solid mode, versus 4 hours in Balanced.) You can also dive in and tinker with the settings, but I’m a fan of running with presets, particularly if you’re looking to

take advantage of the closed-loop nature of a single vendor for both machine and materials. Once done, send your job to the machine and wait. At present, there is no job queuing infrastructure. I’d love to see this added to the MakerBot ecosystem at some point; however, the company has just launched a new CloudPrint service, which comes with some nifty ‘in-browser’ pre-processing and build set-up tools, as well as job queueing.

POST-PROCESSING Once your part is complete, it’s a case of removing the build plate and giving it a little flex. The part and its supports should pop right off, perhaps with the encouragement of that ever-present scraper to lift the first raft off the build plate. Once done, pop the build plate back into the machine and it’s ready to again, with no need for manual recalibration. In terms of post-processing, if you’re using breakaway supports (where build and supports are made from the same material), it’s a case of working on the part to shuck those supports away. However, if you’re using the SR-30 support material specifically developed for materials like ABS (as Stratasys no doubt hopes you will), the supports can’t simply be broken away. Instead, you’ll need to circulate your part in an alkaline solution, heated to between 70C and 75C. You can’t just dump it in a bucket and leave it for a while, as you can with PVA. You have a few options here. The first is to invest in a post-processing unit. There are rumours that MakerBot is working on its own branded version, but for now, Stratasys already has various units available. Its entry-level model is the WaveWash 55, which was originally released with the Stratasys Mojo, some ten years ago now. The WaveWash 55 is a small unit, which

features a heated carafe and magnetically driven agitation unit in its base. You fill the carafe with water, add an Ecoworks tablet and switch it on. Hey presto, a couple of hours later, your supports have dissolved and you’re left with a nice clean part. That unit costs £650, if you can find one. There’s also larger unit out there that does much the same, but costs a couple of grand. But here’s the thing: We went searching for information on how to achieve this on a shoestring budget and our results were surprising. In short, we managed to achieve the same results using a heated ultrasonic parts washer and a chemical lab stirring device (with a 3D-printed agitator) for a grand total of £150. The Ecoworks tablets come in at around £4 per tablet, but they’re essentially just a sodium hydroxide cleaning agent. We had good success, for example, with OxiClean household cleaner.

2 MakerBot Print ●

allows import of multiple parts and will, by default, spread them across multiple build platforms. Optimising builds takes a little tweaking 3 Slice and Preview ●

gives you excellent feedback on how your part will build 4 The recently ●

introduced CloudPrint service offers a webbased pre-processing environment as well as remote monitoring and build queue capabilities 5 The print preview ●

in Cloud Print is pretty useful, particularly considering there’s no need for an install

IN CONCLUSION The Method X is a far more expensive variant of the Method machine. The standard, PLA- and PVA-focused Method comes in at $4999/€4999; while the Method X variant with full material capabilities, comes in at around $6499/€6499. For that extra grand and a half, you get the ability to work with some far more robust materials. This may well be useful not only for prototyping work, but also for the production of jigs, fixtures and other ancillary parts that 3D printers are often called upon to produce. Makerbot makes a lot of noise about the dimensional accuracy of this machine. In fairness, I have to agree that every part that’s come out of its heated build chamber has been well within the claimed 0.2mm tolerance and by a decent margin too – even in that troublesome Z build direction. DEVELOP3D.COM NOVEMBER 2020 49

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HARDWARE REVIEW It looks like Stratasys is finally letting the Makerbot brand take full advantage of the company’s internal expertise and know-how to build a machine that’s capable of delivering the kinds of results that Stratasys’ traditional machines have been achieving for years. Ultimately, when looking at a machine like the Makerbot Method X, we need to consider several things, particularly in light of the vast range of desktop filament machines now available on the market. The big question, really, is how efficient do you need your part production to be? In other words, do you want to spend hours finessing your machine’s settings and build environment to nail down the production of a part, or do you want to upload a part and get on with your ‘real’ job while it prints? Above all, are you willing to pay extra to achieve parts that are incredibly robust, dimensionally accurate and that won’t need refining during a build to achieve that accuracy? What’s that worth to you? Yes, this machine is certainly more costly than many FDM machines on the market, both in terms of the device itself and its materials. On the other hand, it’s fast and the results are excellent. Parts built in ABS and ASA, for example, are tough, built quickly and 100% cock-on in terms of accuracy every time. You also get a wide range of material options, offering you more freedom and capability from a single machine, and this range is growing all the time. At the time of writing, we’re waiting on a new extruder and materials to test out the carbon-fibre-filled nylon capabilities of the

6 machine, and will keep you up to date with the results of that. For now, the ability to swap spools between ABS, Nylon, ASA, PC ABS and more is incredibly useful. If I had criticisms to offer, one would be that users should be able to turn the machine’s light off. Not all design and engineering facilities are in secure office blocks, after all. Having a light on overnight flags up the machine’s presence. Also, the Method X is a pretty noisy beast. During a build, noise levels reach between 65 and 70 decibels, which to my mind,

brings into question its office-friendliness. But overall, my impression is that if this is the direction in which the MakerBot brand is moving – away from the hobbyist market and into the professional realm – then the Method X is doubtless a harbinger of even more good things to come. The underlying technology, without a doubt, is more Stratasys these days, but the compact package and ease of use is MakerBot all the way, and continues to impress. makerbot.com

6 The Method X ●

nailed the suite of test parts in dimensional accuracy and achieved some pretty decent surface finishes, too

3D PRINT BENCHMARKS: TESTING THE MAKERBOT METHOD X SMALL BATCH COMPONENTS

Test part & Challenge: This is a small, basic pinion gear, the type of thing that might be required in larger volumes, so makes it ideal for initial testing of 3D print machines. The Method X machine could fit 15 of these on a single build tray, and maybe 16 if you pushed things a little.

Material usage & build times: A single one-off took 8.12 grams of ABS and 2.24g of SR-30 support taking 1 hour 9 minutes. Building it solid added an 3g of material and added 30 mins. Building 16 units took 14 hours 22 minutes in Balanced Mode, while in Solid mode, this rose to 20 hrs.

Results: The Makerbot Method X is a consistently impressive machine, particularly when running more difficult filaments such as ABS. The combination of ABS + SR-30 makes things much easier and way more accurate. Everything was within the claimed 0.2mm of accuracy.

Test part & Challenge: This test part is pretty self explanatory: it’s a block model to test both surface quality on more contoured forms, as well as B-side build quality when using both build material supports and dissolvable filaments (such as PVA).

Material usage & build times: In Balanced mode, this part used 22g of ABS/ASA with 19.25g of SR-30 material and took 4 hours 28 minutes to complete. Switching to Solid mode added an hour and used 13g of build material to complete the job.

Results: These brake levers were a perfect example of where the Solid build option pays huge dividends, with stiffer, more robust parts resulting from only a fraction more build time and a little more cost. They’d be ideal for functional tests and the like.

Test part & Challenge: While the Method X’s build chamber wouldn’t fit our largest test part, the rockerbox cover was perfect. It pushed the machine to build complex internal forms as well as those typically tricky circular holes in the Z direction.

Material usage & build times: 102g of ABS or ASA filament per part and 99.4g of SR-30 filament when built in Balanced mode and took 23 hours. Switching to Solid mode pushed up the filament requirement to 165g and build time to 14.5 hours.

Results: This part was a long one for the machine and the internal cavities meant that post-processing wash-out was pretty lengthy as well. That said, the eventual results were well within tolerance, even on those problematic vertical faces.

FORM & BLOCK MODELS

LARGE & CHUNKY BUILDS

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HARDWARE REVIEW

Cricut Maker Don’t be deceived by the craft-focused nature of the company’s marketing message. The Cricut Maker could be a useful addition to any design or engineering office, as Al Dean discovers

ricut specialises in putting capabilities more typically found on the factory floor in the hands of individual makers in their workshops and sheds. The company’s cost-effective but advanced product range includes numerically controlled knife cutting machines. These are akin to the vinyl cutters, CNC routers and laser cutters found in the industrial world, but without the need for the large flatbeds and heavy roller arrangements seen there. While they follow the same principle of cutting along a given path, Cricut’s machines are much smaller and far more affordable for consumers. That’s all very well, you might say – but why are we covering Cricut and its devices in a magazine aimed squarely at professional designers and engineers? Well, as it turns out, having a small, desktop-based machine that cuts materials to your requirements can actually be incredibly useful. At DEVELOP3D, we’ve spoken to a number of folk lately that use these machines in their design offices, on a range of tasks: for example, for packaging prototypes; for small design exploration jobs (such as finding the perfect fit without the need for a 3D print); for creating templates, gauges and gaskets. Thanks to those conversations, we were keen to learn more about Cricut and the Cricut Maker, described by the company as “the ultimate smart cutting machine”.

» Product: Maker » Supplier: Cricut Price: £380 cricut.com

2 PROJECT SET-UP 1 The Cricut Maker is ●

a small machine with a decent working size, which means it can be kept out of the way when not needed 2 Key to its use are ●

the two tool carriers, one for marking and writing, the other providing the business end of the various cutters

First off, setting up is a breeze. You unpack the unit, plug it in, connect it to your workstation via USB and download the software. Cricut’s products are pretty much a closed environment. Everything is proprietary. The software for your desktop or laptop is Cricut’s Design Space; you’ll need to register for this cloud-based software before you get started. There are also some smart applications for iPhone and iPad – more of which later. Once set-up is complete, it’s time to get cutting. The machine comes with a number

of predefined projects, and these are worth working through, even if they do seem a little twee. To give you a general guide on how a project works, you’ll develop the forms you need in your CAD system of choice and export them as either DXF or SVG. Both options have their challenges and benefits. SVG seems to work nicely, but its support in mainstream design and engineering systems is a little patchy at best. And if you go down the DXF route, you’ll need to bear in mind that the Cricut Design Space app’s support is pretty bare bones.

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In other words, it needs the most basic representation of a DXF that your CAD system can generate. In Rhino, for example, we found that DXFs exported using the ‘DXF 2012 option, lines, circles and arc’ option worked best. Once you import your geometry into Design Space, there are a couple of steps you then need to work through. The first is to define the action you would like the machine to perform on each of these geometric entities. While the machine is built for cutting, it uses a number of different types of blade to achieve this. A follower knife is the default and it’s supplied with the system. But all manner of other add-on options are available, including roller blades (useful for fabrics) and attachment blades for scoring, embossing and perforating. You need to select the lines, arcs and circles of your part and assign a function to them. By default, the machine will assume every line is a cut. These individual lines now need to be grouped together, using the Attach operation. Give your part a sensible name and proceed to the fun bit – cutting things out – by hitting the Make button in the top right corner.

GET CUTTING Hitting the Make button moves your project into the Make workspace, which is where you set it up for processing on the machine. Cricut Maker uses an adhesive cutting mat to hold your material in place during cutting; your selection of the most appropriate mat depends on a number of factors. Mats are available in different sizes and with different grip strengths, for example. Some are intended for use with lighter weight materials – think paper or fineweight stock card. Others focus on fabrics or thinner gauge board materials, such as lightweight particle board.

3 Alongside mat selection, your cutting job is also defined by the number of cuts needed to get through your chosen material. The software guides you through the process, offering a wide range of presets and recommendations. While there is a learning curve here, if you spend time exploring your options, you can get good results, first time. If your project is a plain set of cuts on one sheet, you can then start the process. The system asks you to ensure that you have the correct cutting blade in place (a simple process), then fix your materials on the cutting mat. (For some materials, such as thicker leathers and card stocks, additional tape is recommended.) You then feed the board into the machine when prompted.

The machine pulls the sheet into place and registers the blade. By hitting the Go! button, you start the cutting job. If you have multiple sets of sheets, the system will prompt you to remove one mat and add the next (or indeed, reload the same one with more stock). If you’re dealing with a more complex cutting/embossing/ scoring job, you’ll need to swap out the cutting tools when prompted. Once your job is complete, your tools swapped and mats processed, it’s time for the fun part. Depending on the material you’re using, you’ll need to be careful how you remove it from the cutting mat, particularly if you’re working with self-adhesive materials such as vinyl for labelling or self-adhesive films and gaskets.

3 Custom gaskets ●

cut in minutes from a simple 2D CAD sketch in Rhino. Perfect for quickly prototyping to get the best fit possible

WORKFLOW: FROM 3D CAD TO CUT GASKET WITH THE CRICUT MAKER

1 Start with your 2D profile of the part ●

2 Import that file into the Cricut Design ●

5 Select your material. If its known to the ●

6 To get this running, you simply slide your 7 The machine then works through the ● ●

you want to cut. Export that as SVG or DXF. If you opt for DXF, ensure you use a basic export option (lines & arcs).

system, you’ll be guided through which mat to use, how to set up the material and how to configure the machine.

Space software. This will store it to your account for reuse later on. Be careful with customer data.

mat, with material in place, into the machine and hit the flashing load button. Here, we’re using Flexiod for a gasket prototype.

3 The Design Space software will keep ●

your lines and arcs together, but you need to ensure you hit the Attach button to group them properly for making.

cutting process. With thicker materials, it'll make multiple passes, rather than overloading the blade.

4 Design Space then lets you lay out the ● parts on a cutting mat. Here, you can nest them easily if you need multiples. The iOS app also lets you use scraps efficiently.

8 Once done, unload the matt and use the ●

supplied tools to remove your parts from the machine. You might need a sharp craft knife, but that’s about it. Job done.

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HARDWARE REVIEW

(Tesa film, for example, works beautifully with this machine.) If you’re working with thicker or more rigid materials, then this is less of an issue. If you want to repeat your build, you just need to add more material, position the mat again and hit go. Rinse and repeat – it really is that simple.

IN CONCLUSION If you’ve come across these devices before, you may have dismissed them, because of the craft-focused nature of the company’s marketing. That might well be a mistake. The reality is that the Cricut Maker, even with its slightly weird software, is a really useful thing to have around a design studio. Yes, larger scale vinyl cutters are available, but this is missing the point. The Cricut Maker is ideal for those projects where you need to whip the machine out, cut what you need and then tuck it away again. If you’ve got space to have it set up for everyone to use, all the better, but its compact form-factor is a huge benefit. If terms of running costs, once you’ve acquired the machine and spent a few quid on the additional knives and other attachments, you’re only really looking at the cost of cutting mats. These cost around £5 or £10 each and are widely available, as are cheaper off-brand versions. The knives, meanwhile, never dull – or at least, are still serviceable years after purchase – but replacements are pretty widely available. Since we’ve had it, the machine has

4 proved useful on a range of projects, demonstrating just how versatile a numerically controlled cutter can be. These have included creating new signage for an office move; labelling for storage; drilling guides in 4mm card stock; and quick-and-dirty cardboard templates aimed at fine-tuning fit in a Pelicase before we committed to foam cutting. We have even

started experimenting with cutting leather for smaller projects here and there. As long as you spend the time to work out the parameters and how to refine them, then you’re golden. With a little experimentation, you can be pretty confident of achieving results that are repeatable and consistent.

4 The cutter carriage ●

makes it super-simple to swap cutting tools, even half-way through projects to build more complex forms

cricut.com

KNIVES, LASERS AND WATER: FOUR ALTERNATIVES

SILHOUETTE CAMEO 4

GLOWFORGE

WAZER

OMAX PROTOMAX

Product: Cameo 4 Supplier: Silhouette Technology: CNC knife, punch Sheet Size: 304 x 3,000 x 3mm Price: $299 Web: silhouetteamerica.com

Product: Glowforge Supplier: Glowforge Technology: Laser cutter Build Size: 190 x 190 x 196mm Price: $2,495 Web: glowforge.com

Product: Wazer Supplier: Wazer Technology: Abrasive waterjet Build Size: 305 x 460 x 25mm Price: $7,999 Web: wazer.com

Product: ProtoMax Supplier: Omax Technology: Abrasive waterjet Build Size: 300 x 300 x 25mm Price: $23,950 Web: protomax.com

Notes: While Cricut is a well-known brand, there are other cutting machines for the workshop available at a similar price point. While the likes of the Brother Scan and Cut are interesting, a real highlight is the Silhouette Cameo 4, particularly if you’re working on a lot of soft goods projects. While the dual tool option is there, the real standout is the optional roller for tackling really long, 3m materials on a roll.

Notes: Laser cutters were previously split into the ‘small but potentially lethal’ and ‘large and costly’ camps for quite some time. Glowforge transformed this picture with its desktop-sized machine, smarter software and sensing options. The range now includes upgraded filtration, faster speeds and there’s also an option to have an ‘infinite’ pass-through, so your build size increases dramatically in the Y direction.

Notes: Wazer was born at Philadelphia’s Penn Engineering college and, following a $1.3 million crowdfunder, has been quietly providing one of the most interesting tools for serious prototyping labs. The Wazer machine (comprised of the cutting and pump units) is an abrasive waterjet at a fraction of the cost traditionally associated with such machines. It has a respectable and useful cutting envelope and is no slouch in the speed department.

Notes: Omax is a name associated with advanced waterjet cutters typically found in the machine shop, rather than in prototyping labs, so the ProtoMax is an interesting departure for the firm. It’s a smaller scale machine, fully enclosed and ready for use in the workshop. The 5hp pump generates 30,000 PSI in cutting power, which will happily see its way through material up to 1-inch thick, from foam to tool steel.

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From BIM to digital fabrication Building Information Modelling (BIM) for Architecture, Engineering and Construction

Building Information Modelling technology for Architecture, Engineering & Construction

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HARDWARE REVIEW

3Dconnexion CadMouse » A legend in the CAD user community, 3Dconnexion has recently updated its CadMouse product range. Al Dean takes a look at what’s on offer if you’re in the market for a customisable, three-button input device

1 » Product: CadMouse » Supplier: 3dconnexion Price: From £80 3dconnexion.com

onsidering the amount of time we spend using workstations these days, it always amazes me how few real options there are for professionals who need a proper mouse. At first glance, the options seem to fall into one of three categories: the crappy mouse that came with your computer five years ago; a Logitech product (its MX mice are great and very popular); or something plucked from the gaming world, with day-glo orange lights and a name like Baztardz. But these are not, in fact, the only options out there. A few years ago, 3Dconnexion, a company well-known in the CAD world, decided it would extend its range beyond 3D motion controller devices and offer a mouse squarely aimed at professionals. And thus, the CadMouse was born. The CadMouse range came with a couple of differentiators; above all, the addition of a proper third mouse button. While many mice include a middle button located underneath the scroll wheel, 3Dconnexion took the decision to separate the two and make the mouse more usable in the process. That means no more accidentally catching the button while you’re scrolling or zooming in or out – and no accidental zooming when you’re trying to rotate your model.

dongle (or indeed, via the Micro USB cable if you need to charge while using it). The CadMouse Pro Wireless is available in both left- and right-hand models, at £107. The next step down is the CadMouse Pro, which takes the form factor of the CadMouse Pro Wireless, but does away with wireless connectivity. This is good if you’re looking for a mouse that will be permanently connected to your workstation, or have security concerns around Bluetooth, or just need to save a few quid. This costs £89.

SMALLER DEVICES Alongside these larger devices, 3DConnexion has also updated its smaller products, which are suitable for those who prefer less of a ‘chunk’ in the hand or something a little more portable. Following the same form factor but on a smaller scale, the CadMouse Compact devices now come in both wired and wireless formats

(but no left-hand options, I’m afraid), priced at £80 and £89 respectively.

IN CONCLUSION Regardless of which device you choose, the portable devices or their larger counterparts, you’re guaranteed the build quality for which 3Dconnexion is known. Personally speaking, I’ve never really seen the need to overly customise a mouse to specific tasks, but the option is there should you want it. And if you’re using one of these mice in combination with a 3Dconnexion SpaceMouse motion controllers, you’ll have a full suite of customisation options to fully enable a two-handed approach. The new additions to the CADmouse range flesh out the lower end of the portfolio nicely, and it’s good to see a range that can comfortably accommodate most user budgets and requirements. 3dconnexion.com

1 Left to Right: ●

CadMouse Pro Wireless; CadMouse Pro Wireless Left; CadMouse Pro; CadMouse Compact; and CadMouse Compact Wireless 2 The CadMouse ●

products are also available in bundles that include 3Dconnexion’s motion control devices

LARGER DEVICES While the range of CadMouse products has expanded in the last year or so, the most recent update has really fleshed things out considerably. At the top end of the range is the CadMouse Pro Wireless. This brings together the full gamut of what these devices offer – customisable buttons, CAD-integrated at a driver level – in a full-size wireless model. Wireless connectivity is via Bluetooth or USB

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HARDWARE REVIEW

Fujitsu Celsius J5010 » If you’re after a quiet, well-built and compact workstation that also packs a punch then the Fujitsu Celsius 5010 ticks all the boxes, writes Greg Corke » Intel Xeon W-1270 CPU (8-cores (3.4GHz, 5.0GHz Turbo) » Nvidia Quadro P2200 GPU (5GB GDDR5X memory) » 32GB (2 x 16GB) DDR4 ECC memory » 512 GB PCIe NVMe M.2 SSD » 314mm (w) x 296mm (d) x 89mm (h) » Approx. 8 kg » Microsoft Windows 10 Professional 64-bit » 3-year warranty £1,699 (Ex VAT) fujitsu.com

3 The Celsius J5010 ●

can take a full-height GPU, such as the Quadro P2200, thanks to a riser card that makes the GPU sit parallel, rather than perpendicular, to the motherboard

he small form factor (SFF) workstation is no longer the entry-level machine it used to be. Like other workstations in its class, the Fujitsu Celsius J5010 packs a phenomenal amount of processing power into its 8.3 litre chassis. With a choice of 10th generation Intel Core or Intel Xeon W-1200 processors (with up to 10 cores) and up to 128 GB RAM, it’s ideal for a range of 3D designcentric workflows – not just CAD or BIM, but entry-level simulation, point cloud processing, even ray trace rendering. Graphics are more mainstream, but it still supports a wide range of CADfocused GPUs, including the Nvidia Quadro P2200 (5GB), which is typically found in workstations much larger in size, but more on that later on. Our test machine’s Intel Xeon W-1270 (8 cores, 3.4GHz, 5.0GHz Turbo) might not be the fastest Xeon W-1200 series CPU out there, but it’s notably cheaper than the Xeon W-1290 (10 cores, 3.2GHz, 5.2GHz Turbo) and is still perfect for CAD. Indeed, in CAD software Solidworks it took 77 secs to export our IGES model. This is only two seconds slower than the Scan 3XS GWP-ME Q120C (tinyurl.com/ scan-i9k) and its Intel Core-i9-10900K (10 cores, 5.0GHz overclock) which currently tops our charts. Throughout the single-threaded Solidworks test, the Xeon W-1270 maintained a steady 4.7GHz. This is a touch lower than the advertised Turbo of 5.0GHz, but nothing unusual, as theory and practice rarely align. For design visualisation, the Celsius J5010 tells a slightly different story. It completed our multi-threaded KeyShot rendering test in 346 secs, a little slower than we expected. Here, we observed all 8 cores running at 3.6GHz, only a touch above the base clock of 3.4GHz. In a larger desktop workstation, where there’s more space and beefier fans, we would expect the same CPU to clock a little higher. In the Scan 3XS GWP-CAD Q116C, for example, the 8-core Intel Core i99900K ran at 4.2GHz, completing our render test 53 secs faster. On paper, this machine looks a great fit for point cloud processing, another multi-threaded process. But you might need to apply a few tweaks here and there in

order to get the best performance. Leica Cyclone Register 360, popular in the AEC sector, really needs 64 GB+ of memory to get the best out of the software, so our test machine is a little light with its 32 GB. Simply doubling up RAM would considerably improve on the 4,511 secs it took to import and register our 90 GB point cloud dataset, as it would allow the software to use significantly more of the workstation’s 8 CPU cores (see tinyurl. com/leica-CPU for more info). Those dealing with large datasets might also consider increasing storage capacity. While the 512 GB M.2 NVMe SSD is fine for general workflows, it is also available in sizes up to 2 TB. For even more capacity, there’s room for two 2.5-inch SATA HDDs, or one 3.5-inch SATA HDD up to 8 TB. The HDDs are held in a modular drive bay, which can be easily clipped out from the chassis after removing its cover, also revealing the M.2 SSD on the motherboard. The chassis itself is very well built, incredibly solid and, at 8kg, surprisingly heavy for a machine of this size (314 x 296 x 89 mm). It can be positioned horizontally or vertically with detachable feet that give it stability. It’s also well-equipped with ports, with 2 x USB 2.0, 2 x USB 3.2 Gen 2 and 1 x USB 3.2 Gen 2 Type-C on the front and plenty more on the rear, along with an RJ-45, Mouse/ Keyboard (PS/2) and a 25-pin parallel port, something we’ve not seen in eons. There’s also an optional M.2 Wi-Fi module. Considering its size, the Celsius J5010 does an incredible job of cooling. Throughout all of our tests, it was virtually silent, testament to the smart engineering inside. In fact, fan noise only became noticeable when rendering on both the CPU and GPU, something that most users are unlikely to do with this machine.

THE GPU DIFFERENTIATOR? For many years, Fujitsu has uniquely supported a full-height graphics card in its SFF workstations. This is done by way of a riser card that makes the GPU sit

parallel, rather than perpendicular, to the motherboard. It means the Celsius J5010 can be configured with the Nvidia Quadro P2200, rather than being limited to the low profile Quadro P1000. In the past, this has given Fujitsu a notable advantage over the competition, but now with Dell and HP offering custom versions of the mobile Quadro RTX 3000 in their new SFF workstations, this is no longer the case. We haven’t tested the Quadro RTX 3000 but, on paper, it should offer a small improvement over the Quadro P2200, plus dedicated RT and Tensor cores for ray trace rendering, and entry-level VR support. Of course, not everyone needs or wants to pay for such levels of graphics performance and the Quadro P2200 is still a great choice for CAD and BIMcentric workflows. When working at FHD resolution, you can even get decent performance in demanding real-time viz tools like Enscape, where we recorded 24 frames per second when navigating a sizeable museum model.

CONCLUSION If you’re on the lookout for a quiet, well-built, compact workstation that packs a punch in both single-threaded and multithreaded workflows, then the Fujitsu Celsius 5010 ticks all the boxes. While the specs in our review machine are well-suited to CAD (with the option of even moving down to a 6-core Intel Xeon W-1250), the chassis gives plenty of scope to ramp up the specs in all areas. Adding more memory, CPU cores and storage would make the machine much better suited to simulation, CAM, point cloud processing and CPU ray tracing. You simply won’t get the same flexibility in an Ultra Small Form Factor (USFF) workstation like the HP Z2 Mini G5 or Dell Precision 3240. The one area where the Celsius J5010 can’t get a boost is the GPU. And while the Quadro P2200 will serve most workflows well, those that need more oomph may be better served by the HP Z2 SFF or Dell Precision 3440, which both carry the Quadro RTX 3000. DEVELOP3D.COM NOVEMBER 2020 57

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THE LAST WORD

Having spent the last month examining the current crop of desktop 3D printers, Al Dean has come to the conclusion that while great hardware is one thing, it’s the software that really makes these devices sing

ong-time readers of DEVELOP3D will know that I’ve always been cautiously optimistic about the potential for desktop 3D printing. I’ve seen these machines mature, progress and become truly useful in the last 10 or so years. This month, I got to spend some close-up time with three new machines, each very different and each with its own strengths and weaknesses. If I look at these machines as a group, what impresses me most is how much the build quality of the parts that come out of them has improved. We’re talking here about parts that are pretty cock-on in terms of dimensional accuracy. It seems that the hardware manufacturers have finally worked out how to make accurate parts on the desktop after all. That, in turn, can only make such machines more useful to the product design and engineering professional. After all, its one thing to knock out a model of a boat (read: the common ‘Benchy’ benchmark model). It’s quite another to build parts that match exactly the intent and that are sufficiently within tolerance to be useful and meaningful for design review, for engineering evaluation and yes, in some instances, end use. How have they achieved this? The answer lies in having a more precise view of what machines and materials are doing. Each machine is built to make the most of the materials it supports (with the exception of the Raise3D machine) and to control that

material’s behaviour during builds. And much of that control comes down to one thing: software. And just as with hardware, software tends to come with some great features that make perfect sense to you and others that drive you absolutely batshit crazy. I’ll give you two examples. The first is Formlabs’ Dashboard service. This is cloudbased and, while it doesn’t yet contain the pre-processing you need to prepare a part for print in one of its machines, it helps monitor builds. It also tracks how you and your team use your machines, from what materials are used to the lifespan left in build tanks. That is incredibly useful for those using such machines in a commercial environment, since it allows them to not only strip out costs for project costing, but also affords a quick look into future costs, which is great for setting realistic budgets. Makerbot is working on a similar range of functions for its CloudPrint service. Other vendors are doing the same. In fact, all across the full spectrum of additive, this is becoming a trend. Attention is turning to the process management aspects of additive, rather than pure cycling of parts out of a machine. The desktop is just a microcosm of that trend. Then you get the infuriating things. One personal pet peeve is the dialogue that pops up when you import a part and it doesn’t quite fit the build volume of your machine. What would be the most sensible option for the software to offer here? Let’s think. It has the geometry, so it could quickly work

2 out a bounding box. It could offer to rotate your part. It could offer to carry out some analysis to find a better fit. But no. What we actually get is this: “Hi. Your part is too big. Do you want me to shrink it to an arbitrary percentage?” It might be that 2020 is getting to me, but every time this pops up, I twitch and mutter under my breath: “No, I don’t. I don’t want you to scale the part. Just like I don’t want you to build me a Yoda head or a frigging tugboat. Find me a way to build this part in your known volume, using the materials available.” Is that really too much to ask? The thing is, the machine never answers me. I inevitably end up clicking ‘No’ and then spend 10 minutes twiddling the part around to get it to fit, just as I knew it would all along.

1 Raise3D’s ●

Ideamaker is smart and makes excellent use of the machine’s dual independent extruders 2 Formlabs Preform ●

is clear, concise and generally excellent 3 Positively, ●

absolutely, NEVER click on yes

GET IN TOUCH: Email on al@x3dmedia.com or on Twitter, @ alistardean. He’s rather glad that the 3D printers he reviewed for this issue have finally been picked up. His landlord was starting to complain about the heat coming off the electricity meter.

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