3-d printing is great, assuming you're printingone material for one purpose, and that you’re fine with a few do-overs. but the technologyis still far behind in reliably producing a variety of useful objects, with no assemblyrequired, at a moderate cost. in recent years, companies have been workingto tackle some of these challenges with “multi-material†3-d printers that can fabricate many differentfunctional items. such printers, however, have traditionally been limited to three materialsat a time, can cost as much as $250,000 each, and still require a fair amount of human intervention. but, researchers at mit say that they’vefound a way to make a better, cheaper, more user-friendly printer. they presented a 3-dprinter that can print an unprecedented 10
different materials at once by using 3-d-scanningtechniques that save time, energy, and money. delivering resolution at 40 microns — orless than half the width of a human hair — the “multifab†system is the first 3-d printerto use 3-d-scanning techniques from machine vision, which offers two key advantages inaccuracy and convenience over traditional 3-d printing. first, multifab can self-calibrate and self-correct,freeing users from having to do the fine-tuning themselves. for each layer of the design,the system’s feedback loop 3-d scans and detects errors and then generates so-called“correction masks.†this approach allows the use of inexpensive hardware while ensuringprint accuracy.
secondly, multifab gives users the abilityto embed complex components, such as circuits and sensors, directly onto the body of anobject, meaning that it can produce a finished product, moving parts and all, in one fellswoop. the researchers have used multifab to printeverything from smartphone cases to light-emitting diode lenses — and they envision an arrayof applications in consumer electronics, microsensing, medical imaging, and telecommunications, amongother things. they plan to also experiment with embedding motors and actuators that wouldmake it possible to 3-d print more advanced electronics, including robots. multifab was built using low-cost, off-the-shelfcomponents that cost around $7,000 total.
there are many technical challenges to creatinga printer like multifab: different materials require different pressures and temperatures,so printing something complex usually involves printing all individual pieces separately,and then assembling them by hand.
what materials are used for 3d printing,but with multifab, you simply put the componentsinto the platform and the printer does the rest. cameras automatically scan the components'three-dimensional geometries and uses that information to print other objects aroundthem. for example, you can put an iphone into the printer, and program the system to printa case that is directly affixed onto the phone.
