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97-522: SuperDraco rocket engines utilize a storable (non-cryogenic) hypergolic propellant which allows the engines to be fired many months after fueling and launch. They combine the functions of both a reaction control system and a main propulsive engine . Hypergolic fuels do not require an external source of ignition, providing increased reliability for the spacecraft. The engines are used on crew transport flights to low Earth orbit , and were also projected to be used for entry, descent and landing control of

194-416: A nozzle , thereby producing thrust. In rockets, the burning of rocket fuel produces an exhaust, and the exhausted material is usually expelled as a propellant under pressure through a nozzle . The exhaust material may be a gas , liquid , plasma , or a solid . In powered aircraft without propellers such as jets , the propellant is usually the product of the burning of fuel with atmospheric oxygen so that

291-460: A plasma which is used as the propellant. They use a nozzle to direct the energized propellant. The nozzle itself may be composed simply of a magnetic field. Low molecular weight gases (e.g. hydrogen, helium, ammonia) are preferred propellants for this kind of system. Electromagnetic thrusters use ions as the propellant, which are accelerated by the Lorentz force or by magnetic fields, either of which

388-544: A 25% weight reduction, and reduced assembly times. A fuel nozzle is the perfect inroad for additive manufacturing in a jet engine since it allows for optimized design of the complex internals and it is a low-stress, non-rotating part. Similarly, in 2015, PW delivered their first AM parts in the PurePower PW1500G to Bombardier. Sticking to low-stress, non-rotating parts, PW selected the compressor stators and synch ring brackets to roll out this new manufacturing technology for

485-490: A 3D service provider specializing in Howtek single nozzle inkjet and SDI printer support. James K. McMahon worked with Steven Zoltan, 1972 drop-on-demand inkjet inventor, at Exxon and has a patent in 1978 that expanded the understanding of the single nozzle design inkjets (Alpha jets) and helped perfect the Howtek, Inc hot-melt inkjets. This Howtek hot-melt thermoplastic technology is popular with metal investment casting, especially in

582-688: A British patient named Steve Verze received the world's first fully 3D-printed prosthetic eye from the Moorfields Eye Hospital in London . In April 2024, the world's largest 3D printer, the Factory of the Future 1.0 was revealed at the University of Maine . It is able to make objects 96 feet long, or 29 meters. In 2024, researchers used machine learning to improve the construction of synthetic bone and set

679-483: A broad variety of payloads. Aerosol sprays , in which a liquid is ejected as a spray, include paints, lubricants, degreasers, and protective coatings; deodorants and other personal care products; cooking oils. Some liquid payloads are not sprayed due to lower propellant pressure and/or viscous payload, as with whipped cream and shaving cream or shaving gel. Low-power guns, such as BB guns , paintball guns, and airsoft guns, have solid projectile payloads. Uniquely, in

776-400: A compressor, rather than by a chemical reaction. The pressures and energy densities that can be achieved, while insufficient for high-performance rocketry and firearms, are adequate for most applications, in which case compressed fluids offer a simpler, safer, and more practical source of propellant pressure. A compressed fluid propellant may simply be a pressurized gas, or a substance which is

873-496: A continuous filament of a thermoplastic material, is the most common 3D printing process in use as of 2020 . The umbrella term additive manufacturing (AM) gained popularity in the 2000s, inspired by the theme of material being added together ( in any of various ways ). In contrast, the term subtractive manufacturing appeared as a retronym for the large family of machining processes with material removal as their common process. The term 3D printing still referred only to

970-399: A fluid which is used to expel the products of that chemical reaction (and sometimes other substances) as propellants. For example, in a simple hydrogen/oxygen engine, hydrogen is burned (oxidized) to create H 2 O and the energy from the chemical reaction is used to expel the water (steam) to provide thrust. Often in chemical rocket engines, a higher molecular mass substance is included in

1067-431: A gas at atmospheric pressure, but stored under pressure as a liquid. In applications in which a large quantity of propellant is used, such as pressure washing and airbrushing , air may be pressurized by a compressor and used immediately. Additionally, a hand pump to compress air can be used for its simplicity in low-tech applications such as atomizers , plant misters and water rockets . The simplest examples of such

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1164-422: A lower variability in materials properties ." According to Elon Musk, cost reduction through 3D printing is also significant, in particular because SpaceX can print an hourglass chamber where the entire wall consists of internal cooling channels, which would be impossible without additive manufacturing. Storable propellant A propellant (or propellent ) is a mass that is expelled or expanded in such

1261-402: A modest pressure. This pressure is high enough to provide useful propulsion of the payload (e.g. aerosol paint, deodorant, lubricant), but is low enough to be stored in an inexpensive metal can, and to not pose a safety hazard in case the can is ruptured. The mixture of liquid and gaseous propellant inside the can maintains a constant pressure, called the liquid's vapor pressure . As the payload

1358-510: A number of years. Both BPM 3D printers and SPI 3D printers use Howtek, Inc style Inkjets and Howtek, Inc style materials. Royden Sanders licensed the Helinksi patent prior to manufacturing the Modelmaker 6 Pro at Sanders prototype, Inc (SPI) in 1993. James K. McMahon who was hired by Howtek, Inc to help develop the inkjet, later worked at Sanders Prototype and now operates Layer Grown Model Technology,

1455-411: A plasma and expel the plasma as propellant. In the case of a resistojet rocket engine, the compressed propellant is simply heated using resistive heating as it is expelled to create more thrust. In chemical rockets and aircraft, fuels are used to produce an energetic gas that can be directed through a nozzle , thereby producing thrust. In rockets, the burning of rocket fuel produces an exhaust, and

1552-440: A propellant because they move at relativistic speed, i.e., the speed of light. In this case Newton's third Law of Motion is inadequate to model the physics involved and relativistic physics must be used. In chemical rockets, chemical reactions are used to produce energy which creates movement of a fluid which is used to expel the products of that chemical reaction (and sometimes other substances) as propellants. For example, in

1649-461: A reaction mass to create the thrust, such as with a chemical rocket engine, propellant and fuel are two distinct concepts. Vehicles can use propellants to move by ejecting a propellant backwards which creates an opposite force that moves the vehicle forward. Projectiles can use propellants that are expanding gases which provide the motive force to set the projectile in motion. Aerosol cans use propellants which are fluids that are compressed so that when

1746-585: A record for shock absorption. In July 2024, researchers published a paper in Advanced Materials Technologies describing the development of artificial blood vessels using 3D-printing technology, which are as strong and durable as natural blood vessels . The process involved using a rotating spindle integrated into a 3D printer to create grafts from a water-based gel, which were then coated in biodegradable polyester molecules. Additive manufacturing or 3D printing has rapidly gained importance in

1843-566: A regeneratively cooled SuperDraco rocket chamber emerging from an EOS 3D metal printer, and indicated that it was composed of the Inconel superalloy. This was later shown to be the production technique for the flight-level engines. It was announced in May 2014 that the flight-qualified version of the SuperDraco engine is the first fully 3D printed rocket engine . In particular, the engine combustion chamber

1940-489: A simple hydrogen/oxygen engine, hydrogen is burned (oxidized) to create H 2 O and the energy from the chemical reaction is used to expel the water (steam) to provide thrust. Often in chemical rocket engines, a higher molecular mass substance is included in the fuel to provide more reaction mass. Rocket propellant may be expelled through an expansion nozzle as a cold gas, that is, without energetic mixing and combustion, to provide small changes in velocity to spacecraft by

2037-451: A system are squeeze bottles for such liquids as ketchup and shampoo. However, compressed gases are impractical as stored propellants if they do not liquify inside the storage container, because very high pressures are required in order to store any significant quantity of gas, and high-pressure gas cylinders and pressure regulators are expensive and heavy. Liquefied gas propellants are gases at atmospheric pressure, but become liquid at

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2134-512: A total duration of more than 300 seconds, and it likewise completed a full qualification test. The SuperDraco completed qualification testing in May 2014 – including testing "across a variety of conditions including multiple starts, extended firing durations and extreme off-nominal propellant flow and temperatures." By January 2015, SpaceX demonstrated the SuperDraco engine pod with full functionality at McGregor, Texas. Four of these engine pods, each containing two SuperDraco engines, will be used in

2231-405: A total of 58 times for a total firing-time duration of 117 seconds and SpaceX expressed hope that the test results would exceed the original requirements for the engine. A second version of the engine was developed in 2013, this one manufactured with 3D printing rather than the traditional casting technique . By July 2014, the 3D-printed engine combustion chamber had been fired over 80 times, for

2328-492: A variety of usually ionized propellants, including atomic ions, plasma, electrons, or small droplets or solid particles as propellant. If the acceleration is caused mainly by the Coulomb force (i.e. application of a static electric field in the direction of the acceleration) the device is considered electrostatic. The types of electrostatic drives and their propellants: These are engines that use electromagnetic fields to generate

2425-404: A way as to create a thrust or another motive force in accordance with Newton's third law of motion , and "propel" a vehicle, projectile , or fluid payload. In vehicles, the engine that expels the propellant is called a reaction engine . Although technically a propellant is the reaction mass used to create thrust, the term "propellant" is often used to describe a substance which contains both

2522-420: A way to reduce cost, reduce the number of nonconforming parts, reduce weight in the engines to increase fuel efficiency and find new, highly complex shapes that would not be feasible with the antiquated manufacturing methods. One example of AM integration with aerospace was in 2016 when Airbus delivered the first of GE's LEAP engines. This engine has integrated 3D printed fuel nozzles, reducing parts from 20 to 1,

2619-407: Is a mass that is expelled from a vehicle, such as a rocket, in such a way as to create a thrust in accordance with Newton's third law of motion , and "propel" the vehicle forward. The engine that expels the propellant is called a reaction engine . Although the term "propellant" is often used in chemical rocket design to describe a combined fuel/propellant, propellants should not be confused with

2716-440: Is depleted, the propellant vaporizes to fill the internal volume of the can. Liquids are typically 500-1000x denser than their corresponding gases at atmospheric pressure; even at the higher pressure inside the can, only a small fraction of its volume needs to be propellant in order to eject the payload and replace it with vapor. Vaporizing the liquid propellant to gas requires some energy, the enthalpy of vaporization , which cools

2813-436: Is generated by electricity: Nuclear reactions may be used to produce the energy for the expulsion of the propellants. Many types of nuclear reactors have been used/proposed to produce electricity for electrical propulsion as outlined above. Nuclear pulse propulsion uses a series of nuclear explosions to create large amounts of energy to expel the products of the nuclear reaction as the propellant. Nuclear thermal rockets use

2910-417: Is printed of Inconel , an alloy of nickel and iron, using a process of direct metal laser sintering , and operates at a chamber pressure 6,900 kilopascals (1,000 psi) at a very high temperature. The engines are contained in a printed protective nacelle to prevent fault propagation in the event of an engine failure. The ability to 3D print the complex parts was key to achieving the low-mass objective of

3007-632: Is the technology's ability to produce complex geometries with high precision and accuracy. This is particularly relevant in the field of microwave engineering, where 3D printing can be used to produce components with unique properties that are difficult to achieve using traditional manufacturing methods. Additive Manufacturing processes generate minimal waste by adding material only where needed, unlike traditional methods that cut away excess material. This reduces both material costs and environmental impact. This reduction in waste also lowers energy consumption for material production and disposal, contributing to

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3104-481: Is used to compress the air is stored until it is released by allowing the propellant to escape. Compressed fluid may also be used only as energy storage along with some other substance as the propellant, such as with a water rocket , where the energy stored in the compressed air is the fuel and the water is the propellant. Proposed photon rockets would use the relativistic momentum of photons to create thrust. Even though photons do not have mass, they can still act as

3201-525: The Lorentz force may be used to expel negative ions and electrons as the propellant. Electrothermal engines use the electromagnetic force to heat low molecular weight gases (e.g. hydrogen, helium, ammonia) into a plasma and expel the plasma as propellant. In the case of a resistojet rocket engine, the compressed propellant is simply heated using resistive heating as it is expelled to create more thrust. In chemical rockets and aircraft, fuels are used to produce an energetic gas that can be directed through

3298-543: The UV exposure area is controlled by a mask pattern or a scanning fiber transmitter. He filed a patent for this XYZ plotter, which was published on 10 November 1981. (JP S56-144478). His research results as journal papers were published in April and November 1981. However, there was no reaction to the series of his publications. His device was not highly evaluated in the laboratory and his boss did not show any interest. His research budget

3395-441: The fuel that is used by an engine to produce the energy that expels the propellant. Even though the byproducts of substances used as fuel are also often used as a reaction mass to create the thrust, such as with a chemical rocket engine, propellant and fuel are two distinct concepts. In electrically powered spacecraft , electricity is used to accelerate the propellant. An electrostatic force may be used to expel positive ions, or

3492-423: The relativistic momentum of photons to create thrust. Even though photons do not have mass, they can still act as a propellant because they move at relativistic speed, i.e., the speed of light. In this case Newton's third Law of Motion is inadequate to model the physics involved and relativistic physics must be used. In chemical rockets, chemical reactions are used to produce energy which creates movement of

3589-626: The stereolithography process. The application of the French inventors was abandoned by the French General Electric Company (now Alcatel-Alsthom) and CILAS (The Laser Consortium). The claimed reason was "for lack of business perspective". In 1983, Robert Howard started R.H. Research, later named Howtek, Inc. in Feb 1984 to develop a color inkjet 2D printer, Pixelmaster, commercialized in 1986, using Thermoplastic (hot-melt) plastic ink. A team

3686-448: The 1980s cost upwards of $ 300,000 ($ 650,000 in 2016 dollars). AM processes for metal sintering or melting (such as selective laser sintering , direct metal laser sintering , and selective laser melting) usually went by their own individual names in the 1980s and 1990s. At the time, all metalworking was done by processes that are now called non-additive ( casting , fabrication , stamping , and machining ); although plenty of automation

3783-722: The 3D printing jewelry industry. Sanders (SDI) first Modelmaker 6Pro customer was Hitchner Corporations, Metal Casting Technology, Inc in Milford, NH a mile from the SDI facility in late 1993-1995 casting golf clubs and auto engine parts. On 8 August 1984 a patent, US4575330, assigned to UVP, Inc., later assigned to Chuck Hull of 3D Systems Corporation was filed, his own patent for a stereolithography fabrication system, in which individual laminae or layers are added by curing photopolymers with impinging radiation, particle bombardment, chemical reaction or just ultraviolet light lasers . Hull defined

3880-539: The Draco thruster, was designed to provide multiple restart capability and use the same shared hypergolic propellants as Draco. Its primary purpose was to be for SpaceX's launch abort system (LAS) on the Dragon spacecraft. According to a NASA press release, the engine has a transient from ignition to full thrust of 100 ms. During launch abort, eight SuperDracos were expected to fire for 5 seconds at full thrust. The development of

3977-528: The Dragon 2 crewed spacecraft. In April 2015, SpaceX and NASA set a timeframe to test a Dragon 2's SuperDraco engines with a pad abort test. The test eventually occurred on May 6, 2015, from a test stand at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station SLC-40 . and was successful. On April 20, 2019, the SpaceX Crew Dragon capsule used on DM-1 was destroyed during a test of the SuperDraco engines at Landing Zone 1. On September 5, 2013 Elon Musk tweeted an image of

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4074-445: The VIC 3D printer for this company is available with a video presentation showing a 3D model printed with a single nozzle inkjet. Another employee Herbert Menhennett formed a New Hampshire company HM Research in 1991 and introduced the Howtek, Inc, inkjet technology and thermoplastic materials to Royden Sanders of SDI and Bill Masters of Ballistic Particle Manufacturing (BPM) where he worked for

4171-456: The advantages of design for additive manufacturing , it is clear to engineers that much more is to come. One place that AM is making a significant inroad is in the aviation industry. With nearly 3.8 billion air travelers in 2016, the demand for fuel efficient and easily produced jet engines has never been higher. For large OEMs (original equipment manufacturers) like Pratt and Whitney (PW) and General Electric (GE) this means looking towards AM as

4268-564: The burning of the fuel and, as a consequence, thrust vs time profile. There are three types of burns that can be achieved with different grains. There are four different types of solid fuel/propellant compositions: In rockets, three main liquid bipropellant combinations are used: cryogenic oxygen and hydrogen, cryogenic oxygen and a hydrocarbon, and storable propellants. Propellant combinations used for liquid propellant rockets include: Common monopropellant used for liquid rocket engines include: Electrically powered reactive engines use

4365-514: The capability to deeply reduce their thrust providing precise control during propulsive landing of the Dragon capsule. SuperDraco is the third most powerful engine developed by SpaceX. It is approximately 200 times as powerful as the Draco thruster engine. By comparison, it is more than twice as powerful as the Kestrel engine that was used in SpaceX's Falcon 1 launch vehicle second stage , about 1/9

4462-402: The case of a gas duster ("canned air"), the only payload is the velocity of the propellant vapor itself. 3D printing 3D printing or additive manufacturing is the construction of a three-dimensional object from a CAD model or a digital 3D model . It can be done in a variety of processes in which material is deposited, joined or solidified under computer control , with

4559-435: The compressed air is the fuel and the water is the propellant. In electrically powered spacecraft , electricity is used to accelerate the propellant. An electrostatic force may be used to expel positive ions, or the Lorentz force may be used to expel negative ions and electrons as the propellant. Electrothermal engines use the electromagnetic force to heat low molecular weight gases (e.g. hydrogen, helium, ammonia) into

4656-449: The developing world. In 2012, Filabot developed a system for closing the loop with plastic and allows for any FDM or FFF 3D printer to be able to print with a wider range of plastics. In 2014, Benjamin S. Cook and Manos M. Tentzeris demonstrated the first multi-material, vertically integrated printed electronics additive manufacturing platform (VIPRE) which enabled 3D printing of functional electronics operating up to 40 GHz. As

4753-652: The disadvantage of being flammable . Nitrous oxide and carbon dioxide are also used as propellants to deliver foodstuffs (for example, whipped cream and cooking spray ). Medicinal aerosols such as asthma inhalers use hydrofluoroalkanes (HFA): either HFA 134a (1,1,1,2,-tetrafluoroethane) or HFA 227 (1,1,1,2,3,3,3-heptafluoropropane) or combinations of the two. More recently, liquid hydrofluoroolefin (HFO) propellants have become more widely adopted in aerosol systems due to their relatively low vapor pressure, low global warming potential (GWP), and nonflammability. The practicality of liquified gas propellants allows for

4850-465: The editor-in-chief of Additive Manufacturing magazine, pointed out in 2017 that the terms are still often synonymous in casual usage, but some manufacturing industry experts are trying to make a distinction whereby additive manufacturing comprises 3D printing plus other technologies or other aspects of a manufacturing process . Other terms that have been used as synonyms or hypernyms have included desktop manufacturing , rapid manufacturing (as

4947-590: The engine was partially funded by NASA's CCDev 2 program. Name: Draco comes from the Greek drakōn for dragon. Draco (constellation) is a constellation (the Dragon) in the polar region of the Northern Hemisphere near Cepheus and Ursa Major. SuperDraco engines use a storable propellant mixture of monomethylhydrazine fuel and dinitrogen tetroxide oxidizer . They are capable of being restarted many times, and have

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5044-503: The engine. According to Elon Musk, "It’s a very complex engine, and it was very difficult to form all the cooling channels, the injector head, and the throttling mechanism. Being able to print very high strength advanced alloys ... was crucial to being able to create the SuperDraco engine as it is." The 3D printing process for the SuperDraco engine dramatically reduces lead-time compared to the traditional cast parts, and "has superior strength , ductility , and fracture resistance , with

5141-488: The engines were throttled to 68,170 newtons (15,325 lbf) to maintain vehicle stability. On February 1, 2012 SpaceX announced that it had completed the development of a new, more powerful version of a storable-propellant rocket engine, this one called SuperDraco . This high-thrust hypergolic engine—about 200 times more powerful than the Draco RCS thruster hypergolic engine—offers deep throttling ability, and just like

5238-435: The exhausted material is usually expelled as a propellant under pressure through a nozzle . The exhaust material may be a gas , liquid , plasma , or a solid . In powered aircraft without propellers such as jets , the propellant is usually the product of the burning of fuel with atmospheric oxygen so that the resulting propellant product has more mass than the fuel carried on the vehicle. Proposed photon rockets would use

5335-597: The fabrication of articles on a substrate. On 2 July 1984, American entrepreneur Bill Masters filed a patent for his computer automated manufacturing process and system ( US 4665492 ). This filing is on record at the USPTO as the first 3D printing patent in history; it was the first of three patents belonging to Masters that laid the foundation for the 3D printing systems used today. On 16 July 1984, Alain Le Méhauté , Olivier de Witte, and Jean Claude André filed their patent for

5432-842: The field of engineering due to its many benefits. The vision of 3D printing is design freedom, individualization, decentralization and executing processes that were previously impossible through alternative methods. Some of these benefits include enabling faster prototyping, reducing manufacturing costs, increasing product customization, and improving product quality. Furthermore, the capabilities of 3D printing have extended beyond traditional manufacturing, like lightweight construction, or repair and maintenance with applications in prosthetics, bioprinting, food industry, rocket building, design and art and renewable energy systems. 3D printing technology can be used to produce battery energy storage systems, which are essential for sustainable energy generation and distribution. Another benefit of 3D printing

5529-449: The first commercial 3D printer, the SLA-1, later in 1987 or 1988. The technology used by most 3D printers to date—especially hobbyist and consumer-oriented models—is fused deposition modeling , a special application of plastic extrusion , developed in 1988 by S. Scott Crump and commercialized by his company Stratasys , which marketed its first FDM machine in 1992. Owning a 3D printer in

5626-426: The first decade in which metal end-use parts such as engine brackets and large nuts would be grown (either before or instead of machining) in job production rather than obligately being machined from bar stock or plate. It is still the case that casting, fabrication, stamping, and machining are more prevalent than additive manufacturing in metalworking, but AM is now beginning to make significant inroads, and with

5723-449: The first patent describing 3D printing with rapid prototyping and controlled on-demand manufacturing of patterns. The patent states: As used herein the term printing is not intended in a limited sense but includes writing or other symbols, character or pattern formation with an ink. The term ink as used in is intended to include not only dye or pigment-containing materials, but any flowable substance or composition suited for application to

5820-411: The first time. While AM is still playing a small role in the total number of parts in the jet engine manufacturing process, the return on investment can already be seen by the reduction in parts, the rapid production capabilities and the "optimized design in terms of performance and cost". As technology matured, several authors began to speculate that 3D printing could aid in sustainable development in

5917-407: The fluid was added to the system when the fluid was compressed, such as compressed air . The energy applied to the pump or thermal system that is used to compress the air is stored until it is released by allowing the propellant to escape. Compressed fluid may also be used only as energy storage along with some other substance as the propellant, such as with a water rocket , where the energy stored in

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6014-414: The fuel to provide more reaction mass. Rocket propellant may be expelled through an expansion nozzle as a cold gas, that is, without energetic mixing and combustion, to provide small changes in velocity to spacecraft by the use of cold gas thrusters , usually as maneuvering thrusters. To attain a useful density for storage, most propellants are stored as either a solid or a liquid. A rocket propellant

6111-414: The goal of many of them being to start developing commercial FDM 3D printers that were more accessible to the general public. As the various additive processes matured, it became clear that soon metal removal would no longer be the only metalworking process done through a tool or head moving through a 3D work envelope, transforming a mass of raw material into a desired shape layer by layer. The 2010s were

6208-461: The heat of a nuclear reaction to heat a propellant. Usually the propellant is hydrogen because the force is a function of the energy irrespective of the mass of the propellant, so the lightest propellant (hydrogen) produces the greatest specific impulse . A photonic reactive engine uses photons as the propellant and their discrete relativistic energy to produce thrust. Compressed fluid or compressed gas propellants are pressurized physically, by

6305-427: The high cost would severely limit any widespread enjoyment of a process or apparatus satisfying the foregoing objects. It is therefore an additional object of the invention to minimize use to materials in a process of the indicated class. It is a further object of the invention that materials employed in such a process be salvaged for reuse. According to another aspect of the invention, a combination for writing and

6402-557: The like comprises a carrier for displaying an intelligence pattern and an arrangement for removing the pattern from the carrier. In 1974, David E. H. Jones laid out the concept of 3D printing in his regular column Ariadne in the journal New Scientist . Early additive manufacturing equipment and materials were developed in the 1980s. In April 1980, Hideo Kodama of Nagoya Municipal Industrial Research Institute invented two additive methods for fabricating three-dimensional plastic models with photo-hardening thermoset polymer , where

6499-483: The logical production-level successor to rapid prototyping ), and on-demand manufacturing (which echoes on-demand printing in the 2D sense of printing ). The fact that the application of the adjectives rapid and on-demand to the noun manufacturing was novel in the 2000s reveals the long-prevailing mental model of the previous industrial era during which almost all production manufacturing had involved long lead times for laborious tooling development. Today,

6596-565: The manufacturing and research industries, as the technology was still relatively young and was too expensive for most consumers to be able to get their hands on. The 2000s was when larger scale use of the technology began being seen in industry, most often in the architecture and medical industries, though it was typically used for low accuracy modeling and testing, rather than the production of common manufactured goods or heavy prototyping. In 2005 users began to design and distribute plans for 3D printers that could print around 70% of their own parts,

6693-412: The material being added together (such as plastics, liquids or powder grains being fused), typically layer by layer. In the 1980s, 3D printing techniques were considered suitable only for the production of functional or aesthetic prototypes, and a more appropriate term for it at the time was rapid prototyping . As of 2019 , the precision, repeatability, and material range of 3D printing have increased to

6790-444: The media, and the other used more formally by industrial end-use part producers, machine manufacturers, and global technical standards organizations. Until recently, the term 3D printing has been associated with machines low in price or capability. 3D printing and additive manufacturing reflect that the technologies share the theme of material addition or joining throughout a 3D work envelope under automated control. Peter Zelinski,

6887-542: The mid-1990s, new techniques for material deposition were developed at Stanford and Carnegie Mellon University , including microcasting and sprayed materials. Sacrificial and support materials had also become more common, enabling new object geometries. The term 3D printing originally referred to a powder bed process employing standard and custom inkjet print heads, developed at MIT by Emanuel Sachs in 1993 and commercialized by Soligen Technologies, Extrude Hone Corporation, and Z Corporation . The year 1993 also saw

6984-402: The newly synthesized bishomocubane based compounds are under consideration in the research stage as both solid and liquid propellants of the future. Solid fuel/propellants are used in forms called grains . A grain is any individual particle of fuel/propellant regardless of the size or shape. The shape and size of a grain determines the burn time, amount of gas, and rate of produced energy from

7081-504: The now-canceled Red Dragon to Mars . SuperDracos are used on the SpaceX Dragon 2 crew-transporting space capsule and were used on the DragonFly , a prototype low-altitude reusable rocket that was used for flight testing various aspects of the propulsive-landing technology. While the engine is capable of 73,000 newtons (16,400 lbf) of thrust, during use for DragonFly testing,

7178-520: The original plans of which were designed by Adrian Bowyer at the University of Bath in 2004, with the name of the project being RepRap (Replicating Rapid-prototyper). Similarly, in 2006 the Fab@Home project was started by Evan Malone and Hod Lipson , another project whose purpose was to design a low-cost and open source fabrication system that users could develop on their own and post feedback on, making

7275-523: The point that some 3D printing processes are considered viable as an industrial-production technology; in this context, the term additive manufacturing can be used synonymously with 3D printing . One of the key advantages of 3D printing is the ability to produce very complex shapes or geometries that would be otherwise infeasible to construct by hand, including hollow parts or parts with internal truss structures to reduce weight while creating less material waste. Fused deposition modeling (FDM), which uses

7372-431: The polymer technologies in most minds, and the term AM was more likely to be used in metalworking and end-use part production contexts than among polymer, inkjet, or stereolithography enthusiasts. By the early 2010s, the terms 3D printing and additive manufacturing evolved senses in which they were alternate umbrella terms for additive technologies, one being used in popular language by consumer-maker communities and

7469-429: The price of printers started to drop people interested in this technology had more access and freedom to make what they wanted. As of 2014, the price for commercial printers was still high with the cost being over $ 2,000. The term "3D printing" originally referred to a process that deposits a binder material onto a powder bed with inkjet printer heads layer by layer. More recently, the popular vernacular has started using

7566-458: The process as a "system for generating three-dimensional objects by creating a cross-sectional pattern of the object to be formed". Hull's contribution was the STL (Stereolithography) file format and the digital slicing and infill strategies common to many processes today. In 1986, Charles "Chuck" Hull was granted a patent for this system, and his company, 3D Systems Corporation was formed and it released

7663-501: The project very collaborative. Much of the software for 3D printing available to the public at the time was open source , and as such was quickly distributed and improved upon by many individual users. In 2009 the Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) printing process patents expired. This opened the door to a new wave of startup companies, many of which were established by major contributors of these open source initiatives, with

7760-403: The propellant is allowed to escape by releasing a valve, the energy stored by the compression moves the propellant out of the can and that propellant forces the aerosol payload out along with the propellant. Compressed fluid may also be used as a simple vehicle propellant, with the potential energy that is stored in the compressed fluid used to expel the fluid as the propellant. The energy stored in

7857-522: The propellant). Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) were once often used as propellants, but since the Montreal Protocol came into force in 1989, they have been replaced in nearly every country due to the negative effects CFCs have on Earth's ozone layer . The most common replacements of CFCs are mixtures of volatile hydrocarbons , typically propane , n- butane and isobutane . Dimethyl ether (DME) and methyl ethyl ether are also used. All these have

7954-424: The reaction mass and the fuel that holds the energy used to accelerate the reaction mass. For example, the term "propellant" is often used in chemical rocket design to describe a combined fuel/propellant, although the propellants should not be confused with the fuel that is used by an engine to produce the energy that expels the propellant. Even though the byproducts of substances used as fuel are also often used as

8051-422: The resulting propellant product has more mass than the fuel carried on the vehicle. The propellant or fuel may also simply be a compressed fluid, with the potential energy that is stored in the compressed fluid used to expel the fluid as the propellant. The energy stored in the fluid was added to the system when the fluid was compressed, such as compressed air . The energy applied to the pump or thermal system that

8148-476: The retro-propulsion SuperDraco thruster capabilities. SuperDraco is designed to be highly throttleable , from 100 to 20% of full thrust. This would have been used for precision controllable propulsive landings of the Dragon V2 spacecraft. The SuperDraco engine development program had an extensive test program that spanned several years. As of December 2012, the SuperDraco ground-test engines had been fired

8245-462: The start of an inkjet 3D printer company initially named Sanders Prototype, Inc and later named Solidscape , introducing a high-precision polymer jet fabrication system with soluble support structures, (categorized as a "dot-on-dot" technique). In 1995 the Fraunhofer Society developed the selective laser melting process. In the early 2000s 3D printers were still largely being used just in

8342-549: The surface for forming symbols, characters, or patterns of intelligence by marking. The preferred ink is of a hot melt type. The range of commercially available ink compositions which could meet the requirements of the invention are not known at the present time. However, satisfactory printing according to the invention has been achieved with the conductive metal alloy as ink. But in terms of material requirements for such large and continuous displays, if consumed at theretofore known rates, but increased in proportion to increase in size,

8439-413: The system. This is usually insignificant, although it can sometimes be an unwanted effect of heavy usage (as the system cools, the vapor pressure of the propellant drops). However, in the case of a freeze spray , this cooling contributes to the desired effect (although freeze sprays may also contain other components, such as chloroethane , with a lower vapor pressure but higher enthalpy of vaporization than

8536-624: The term subtractive has not replaced the term machining , instead complementing it when a term that covers any removal method is needed. Agile tooling is the use of modular means to design tooling that is produced by additive manufacturing or 3D printing methods to enable quick prototyping and responses to tooling and fixture needs. Agile tooling uses a cost-effective and high-quality method to quickly respond to customer and market needs, and it can be used in hydro-forming , stamping , injection molding and other manufacturing processes. The general concept of and procedure to be used in 3D-printing

8633-431: The term to encompass a wider variety of additive-manufacturing techniques such as electron-beam additive manufacturing and selective laser melting. The United States and global technical standards use the official term additive manufacturing for this broader sense. The most commonly used 3D printing process (46% as of 2018 ) is a material extrusion technique called fused deposition modeling , or FDM. While FDM technology

8730-460: The thrust of a Merlin 1D engine, and expected to be 1/26th as powerful as the SpaceX Raptor engine. In addition to the use of the SuperDraco thrusters for powered-landings on Earth, NASA's Ames Research Center was studying the feasibility of a Dragon-derived Mars lander for scientific investigation until 2017. Preliminary analysis in 2011 indicated that the final deceleration would be within

8827-551: The use of cold gas thrusters , usually as maneuvering thrusters. To attain a useful density for storage, most propellants are stored as either a solid or a liquid. Propellants may be energized by chemical reactions to expel solid, liquid or gas. Electrical energy may be used to expel gases, plasmas, ions, solids or liquids. Photons may be used to provide thrust via relativistic momentum. Propellants that explode in operation are of little practical use currently, although there have been experiments with Pulse Detonation Engines . Also

8924-650: Was also described by Raymond F. Jones in his story, "Tools of the Trade", published in the November 1950 issue of Astounding Science Fiction magazine. He referred to it as a "molecular spray" in that story. In 1971, Johannes F Gottwald patented the Liquid Metal Recorder, U.S. patent 3596285A, a continuous inkjet metal material device to form a removable metal fabrication on a reusable surface for immediate use or salvaged for printing again by remelting. This appears to be

9021-509: Was applied to those technologies (such as by robot welding and CNC ), the idea of a tool or head moving through a 3D work envelope transforming a mass of raw material into a desired shape with a toolpath was associated in metalworking only with processes that removed metal (rather than adding it), such as CNC milling , CNC EDM , and many others. However, the automated techniques that added metal, which would later be called additive manufacturing, were beginning to challenge that assumption. By

9118-425: Was first described by Murray Leinster in his 1945 short story "Things Pass By": "But this constructor is both efficient and flexible. I feed magnetronic plastics — the stuff they make houses and ships of nowadays — into this moving arm. It makes drawings in the air following drawings it scans with photo-cells. But plastic comes out of the end of the drawing arm and hardens as it comes ... following drawings only" It

9215-565: Was invented after the other two most popular technologies, stereolithography (SLA) and selective laser sintering (SLS), FDM is typically the most inexpensive of the three by a large margin, which lends to the popularity of the process. As of 2020, 3D printers have reached the level of quality and price that allows most people to enter the world of 3D printing. In 2020 decent quality printers can be found for less than US$ 200 for entry-level machines. These more affordable printers are usually fused deposition modeling (FDM) printers. In November 2021

9312-464: Was just 60,000 yen or $ 545 a year. Acquiring the patent rights for the XYZ plotter was abandoned, and the project was terminated. A US 4323756 patent, method of fabricating articles by sequential deposition , granted on 6 April 1982 to Raytheon Technologies Corp describes using hundreds or thousands of "layers" of powdered metal and a laser energy source and represents an early reference to forming "layers" and

9409-515: Was put together, 6 members from Exxon Office Systems, Danbury Systems Division, an inkjet printer startup and some members of Howtek, Inc group who became popular figures in the 3D printing industry. One Howtek member, Richard Helinski (patent US5136515A, Method and Means for constructing three-dimensional articles by particle deposition, application 11/07/1989 granted 8/04/1992) formed a New Hampshire company C.A.D-Cast, Inc, name later changed to Visual Impact Corporation (VIC) on 8/22/1991. A prototype of

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