News and Insights of 3D Printing and Manufacturing
Nike Flyprint is the first 3D-printed textile upper in performance footwear. What it is not is a solution for footwear tooling, though that is something Nike has a long history with.
Stratasys and Phoenix Analysis & Design Technologies (PADT) are teaming with Lockheed Martin Space to deliver next-generation 3D printed parts for NASA’s Orion deep-space spacecraft. Key to the project are Stratasys advanced materials – including an ESD variant of the new Antero 800NA, a PEKK-based thermoplastic offering high performance mechanical, chemical, and thermal properties.
Aerostructures tier-1 supplier Premium AEROTEC reinforces its leading position in the additive manufacturing sector by taking over APWORKS, a metal (Scalmalloy aluminum alloy) 3D printing specialist. Both partners complement the other’s capabilities and aim to profit from the fast-paced growth in the 3D printing market together. Premium AEROTEC and Airbus, the previous owner of APWORKS, have agreed to keep the purchasing price confidential.
Massivit 3D, the leading provider of large format 3D printing solutions for visual communication applications, has announced the appointment of Kevin Sykes as President for North America.
UPM, a Finnish company specializing in driving the forest-based bioindustry into a sustainable, innovation-driven and exciting future, is introducing its new UPM Formi 3D filament. The new product is based on a new type of biocomposite that has been specially developed for 3D printing. It brings together advanced cellulose fibre and biopolymer technologies.
After teasing major 3D printing adoption in a successful April Fools, the BMW Group is now set to – really – invest more than €10 million in its new BMW Additive Manufacturing Campus. Located in Oberschleissheim, just north of Munich, the facility will allow the company to continue developing and further expand its expertise in this field of work.
Arup and CLS Architetti have shared plans to showcase a 3D printed one-bedroom house at Milan’s design festival, Salone del Mobile next month. 3D Housing 05 has been designed to be disassembled and relocated. The team aims to demonstrate that 3D printing concrete technology is now advanced enough to produce flexible and sustainable buildings, quickly and affordably.
A paper that was just submitted to the Cornell University Library describes how to obtain accurate 3D body models and texture of arbitrary people from a single, monocular video in which a person is moving. The paper was authored by Thiemo Alldieck, Marcus Magnor, Weipeng Xu, Christian Theobalt and Gerard Pons-Moll; it will be presented at the upcoming Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition conference in Salt Lake City.
The benefits of additive manufacturing technologies within the jewelry and luxury goods sector are clear. Processes such as stereolithography (SLA) have opened the doors for intricate and beautiful jewelry design as well as customized luxury ornaments. In the case of polymer-based SLA, 3D printed jewelry typically requires molding and casting post-processes to create the final piece.
On the occasion of Ceramitec, held from April 10th to 13th in Munich, 3DCeram-Sinto, a leading 3D ceramic printing system manufacturer (formed as Japan-based Sinto acquired France based 3DCeram), is partnering with German experts DORST Technologies, a major player in technical ceramics (and metal powder processing).