I recently read about a new rapid prototyping technology for metals developed by Stratasys. I read about this in Medical Product Outsourcing but could not find the article on their website.
The technology is called Electron Beam Melting (EBM). From the website:
“Thin layers of metal powder are melted by an electron beam, building your part precisely and quickly.”Â
I’d like to learn more about this technology. Specifically, I wonder if this technology can be used to make rapid prototype molds for injection molding purposes. If so, this could be a wonderful way to make several prototype plastics parts that are functional and may not require the time and money for traditional prototype molds or finished molds.
I haven’t heard of anyone doing exactly that. We have used the following company:
http://www.solidconcepts.com/
Which makes an SLA of the part, then makes a silicone mold from that, which allows you to cast about 25 parts before you need to make a new mold. You can do the whole process fairly quickly, generally less than 2 weeks. It is a great way to make prototypes of things you don’t need in large quantities.
Jacob,
Thanks for your comments. I’m familiar with silicone and urethane molds that can be used for a small quantity of parts. Resources I’ve used include PDT (http://www.pdt.com/) and Realize (http://www.realizeinc.com/).
But parts from these processes are not injection molded components and you can only get ~25 per mold. What if a rapid-prototype injection mold could be created from this EBM process and you could get hundreds of parts? This solution would be ideal for many, many start-ups. Investing in tooling is very expensive and not an easy decision to make for an early stage company.
Cheers,
j
I think you would find the cost of using EBM to create molds prohibitive since it uses titanium and cobalt, I believe using rapid aluminum tooling would probably be more economical.
3d Systems has a sintered process that has been used to create injection molds but I don’t think the technology is quite there yet to produce molds of consistent quality to match standard machined / EDM molds.
Bill,
Thanks for your feedback. I further explored the EBM process and came to a similar conclusion.
http://www.creoquality.com/2007/08/16/update-on-electron-beam-melting-rapid-prototyping-process/
Thanks,
j