We got a look at a mock up of Aurora Labs’ upcoming 3D metal printer.
The Australian company developed a unique 3D metal printing process they first offered towards the academic and lab market at a very low cost – at least for 3D metal printers.
But that’s not their ultimate target market.
We learned some time ago they plan to develop a rugged, large-format 3D metal printer with the ability to print large volumes of metal. Their target market is remote locations that require occasional large 3D metal parts that would usually require long delays and huge shipping costs for heavy metal parts.
Typical users of this concept would be mines located in remote areas where usually no financially viable means of transport are available. It just makes sense to be able to 3D print big parts required for repairs on site, so as to keep the operation up as much as possible.
But what might this system look like?
Above is an image of a mock up of the system they’re working on currently.
They’re calling it the “RMP 1” (standing for “Rapid Manufacturing Printer”), and it has a target volume of a ridiculous 300kg of metal printed every day. To put that in perspective, that’s 12.5kg per hour, or 200g (about half a pound for those of you in the USA) per minute of printing.
The most unusual feature of the mock up system is located on the front side, where you will see a huge, round physical “progress circle” that will quickly indicate via colors the current state of the print.
When the print is complete, it will be flashing green, for example, just like you might see in an app in software. This feature could be quite useful for those operating the machine.
Aurora Labs plans on deploying the machine in stages, initially with slower printing speeds, but eventually warping up to “Aurora Speeds” in a sensible manner.
They won’t say the price of the machine, partly because it’s not available yet, but also because I suspect they haven’t worked it out yet. However, they do say that the price will be “less than the millions other charge”.
Once this machine is available it should be most interesting to see how it is adopted by their target markets.
Via Aurora Laba
