Apr 20, 2018 | By Thomas
EnvisionTEC, a 3D printing solutions company, launches today a groundbreaking new material, E-RigidForm. The company showcased it in a 328-foot 3D printed chain Friday morning at Cobo Center in downtown Detroit and is claiming the record for the world's longest single-piece chain using 3D printing technology.
E-RigidForm is a polyurethane-like resin that 3D prints hard and stiff parts. With a high tensile strength of 68-73 MPa at 7% elongation at break, E-RigidForm is probably one of the most durable printing materials ever developed in 3D printing.
“E-RigidForm is a breakthrough material for use on our 3SP line of 3D printers, which offer very large build areas without sacrificing speed and accuracy,” said EnvisionTEC CEO Al Siblani. E-RigidForm joins an industry-leading materials portfolio at EnvisionTEC that now features 50 materials.
The EnvisionTEC Mega-Chain is 328-feet long and was 3D printed in one piece. It contains 6,144 links, each measuring 1.5". The 16-layer job took 99 hours to print unattended over 4 days. The chain was 3D printed on EnvisionTEC’s largest resin printer, an Xede 3SP, which offers a build area of 18 x 18 x 18 inches. The project was so complex it required a computer with extreme processing power to generate the layers and supports for the print job, an EnvisionTEC press release stated.
“A print job of this size and complexity would not have been possible before, simply because of the stiffness required during the 3D printing process for so many links and layers.” said CEO Al Siblani.
The chain was designed by EnvisionTEC 3D Builder Robert Montes with digital processing and 3D printing support from colleagues Erica Finkowski, Jason Spurlock and Josue Nunes.
According to Guiness World Records, the longest 3D printed non-assembled piece is 37.7 m (123 ft 8.25 in) and was achieved by Made In Space, Inc. (USA) in Moffett Field, California, USA, on 9 August 2017. The beam was made to demonstrate technology that may eventually be used in space.
Posted in 3D Printing Materials
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Brittle crap with such UTS and elongation is called "strongest material ever created for 3D printing"? Please, wake up people from this company. There are quite a few materials out there that would outperform this or will be as good. Cheap American-style marketing crap.
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