Feb. 27, 2015 | By Alec
Anyone on the lookout for a new desktop 3D printer will tell you: choosing one has never been more difficult. As new models are appearing all over the place recently, 3D printer manufacturers need to give their new machines something special to truly stand out. And that can definitely be said about the new DeltaWASP 20-40 Turbo, which could be one of the fastest FDM 3D printers around.
For those of you who’ve never heard of WASP, it might be a good idea to mention Italian entrepreneur and 3D printing innovator Massimo Moretti. Over the past twenty years he has worked on countless innovative projects, and was one of the first people in Italy to fully embrace 3D printing technology in all shapes and sizes; from 3D printed homes to RepRap manufacturing and everything in between. Together with a group of design students, he launched WASP (World Advanced Saving Project) a few years ago, which have been marketing very decent 3D printers since then in all shapes and sizes. Remember his four-meter tall 3D printer last October?
But WASP have already moved on since then, and are now ready to unveil the DeltaWASP 20 40 Turbo version, an advanced edition of their successful DeltaWASP 3D printer. While that previous version was quick, WASP now argues that their latest model will reach crazily quick top speeds of 1000 mm/s.
As WASP explain, they felt the need to experiment with far more powerful electronic boards and processors than are typical on 3D printers, when working on their 4 meter 3D printer last year. "While we were projecting and building the BigDelta printer, we bumped in a huge problem that we never met before: the control board (Arduino Mega) didn’t afford the amount of data that are necessary to move the motor’s axes," WASP explains.
This convinced them to include a pcb board with a 32 bit RISC processor able to do 82 million operations per second. "In the open source world we didn't find more powerful boards: all firmware are for Arduino Mega. This has forced us to take a great work of 'discovery and development' that we share in open source," Moretti writes. "We know the valuable knowledge that we have been donated by the community until now."
When incorporated into a modified DeltaWASP, the results were thus great, though they assure us that the precision hasn’t changed when compared with the non-turbo version. "We tried to solve some Big Delta’s issues and we found new solutions to emprove our small size solid printers. DeltaWASP 20 40, strong and resistant as it is, was fitting the new board’s calculation power, leaving everybody astonished," WASP writes. "DeltaWASP 20 40 manages several millions data per seconds, executing them completely. It seemed like it was going to fly."
As can be seen in the video below, the Turbo 3D printer is insanely fast at 1000 mm/s, though WASP assures us that it accelerates at an even higher pace of 20,000 mm/s².
While very exciting as it is, we will have to wait another week or so for the full release at an unveiling show at the Print Hub in Milan on 5- 7 March. Details about price and availability should also become known at the time. It looks like 3D printing won’t be so time-consuming in the near future.
Posted in 3D Printers
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This seems insane. Judging by how my printer performs at speeds nearing 150 mm/s, it seems like these prints would just be a big mess. How can you even extrude that fast??
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