Stealth startup Studio 3E8 revealed an inexpensive desktop metal 3D printer.
The device, the MESA 1, is set to launch on Kickstarter in December, and it promises “three-click” metal 3D printing, right on your desktop.
As you might imagine, there is very little specific information about how the system works, so we have to examine their images and videos. And that’s just what I did. Here’s their teaser video:
I was quite curious about this system because most metal 3D printers are, well, big trouble. They involve toxic (and sometimes explosive) metal powder, oxygen-free build chambers, powder sieves, complex support structures, etc. The cost of a typical LPBF system is dwarfed by the costs of everything else around it.
So here we have something that apparently sits on a desktop and prints metal parts.
It appears the system “prints” cold powder, then sinters the resulting powder block afterwards to form the metal part.
In the video, you can see different types of powders being deposited by three separate toolheads. The toolheads seem to be for “scaffold” and two metals. By “scaffold”, they mean material that isn’t fused during the sintering process.
That means that the MESA 1 creates a volume of non-fusible powder with the metal part (in powder form) embedded inside. That entire build chamber is then raised to a high temperature with the on-board furnace. The metal powder sinters into fused form, being supported by the scaffold powder. In the end, you simply pull your finished metal part right out of the powder. (But make sure it’s cooled off first.)
There are a number of big advantages with this approach:
- Inexpensive since no fancy lasers, air control systems, powder handling mechanisms, etc., are required.
- No exposure to toxic powder.
- Single (tall) desktop system, probably suitable for office use.
- Ability to use two different metals in the same job (they show carbon steel and copper)
- Ability to use refractive metals like copper.
Should be quite easy to use: plug in cartridges and hit print.
Did I mention the price? They say at launch the system will cost US$3500, far, far below the cost of other metal systems.
But there are some notable disadvantages of this approach:
- Somewhat small build volume, apparently (they haven’t published specs)
- The deposition nozzle appears to be fairly wide, limiting the resolution of parts.
- It’s unclear if the deposition must be continuous or not — if so, then possible geometries are limited.
- There’s no mention of what happens with the leftover scaffold powder; is it thrown out or reused?
- Thermal warping effects that mess up LPBF jobs may also occur here, but there are no support structures to counteract them.
- The build chamber may take considerable time to cool down.
- It does not appear that the build chamber can be swapped out while cooling, so throughput may be severely limited.
And then there’s a lot more we don’t know:
- What is the build volume?
- Which materials can be used?
- Which materials are coming?
- What is the resolution of printing?
- How high is the temperature of the furnace?
- Does the furnace have thermal profiles for heating and cooling different materials? (Probably.)
- How do thermal profiles work for mixed material jobs?
Presumably we will get answers to most of these as the product launches in a few weeks.
As this is a Kickstarter launch, one must always be cautious. However, there are a number of positive signals about this one. First, this company has been around for at least five years. They have investments from multiple firms and have a reasonably sized team. The material provided, though skimpy in details, is quite professional. Studio 3E8 is based in Massachusetts and is not a Chinese company like those launching most new 3D printers these days.
That said, there have been multiple attempts at inexpensive desktop metal 3D printers, and most have failed miserable. This one, however, seems to have more behind it than most I’ve seen.
I’m interested to learn more, and I am sure you are too.
Via Studio 3E8
