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inkjet liquid formulations for metals/ceramics

Posted: Mon Aug 27, 2018 11:02 am
by 3dprinter
Hi!

I'm very interested in 3d printing of metals and ceramics. I have access to muplitple furnaces at our university but the costs of a commercial printer are somewhat high. So I'm thinking in the several DIY builds from here. One problem that I have is the liquid formulation for what I want to do and thus the choice of the printhead.

Can any of you people recommend literature for this kind of problem? The commercial processes from ExOne or Digital Metal e.g. usually involve some heat (or UV?) treatment of each layer to partially cure the liquid to print the next layer on top. The whole bed is then placed in a furnace to cure completely before depowdering.

Thus for the printhead choice, is it smart or even possible to use UV inks for this kind of printing because it's faster and more accurate or is the same also feasable with aquarous liquids and using a heat lamp instead of UV light?

Any input is welcome since I'm currently really clueless about liquid formulations and a strategy to approach the problem in general.

Thank you and best regards!

Re: inkjet liquid formulations for metals/ceramics

Posted: Mon Aug 27, 2018 4:04 pm
by dragonator
I have linked to it before in Plan B.

For both metals and ceramics there are ways of printing that require far simpler binders and anything cured. Metals can either be cast in 3D printed sand molds, or be printed stainless steel powder, which then can be infiltrated with molten bronze. I do not know the ins and outs of that technique, but it is one of the older ones.

http://depts.washington.edu/open3dp/category/formulas/


The link above has some recipes for ceramics that all revolve around maltodextrine and sugar mixed with the ceramics, and a binder based on alcohol. The part can be dried and fired after printing, and it will sinter into a fully functioning ceramic part.

I myself have no experience with UV cured inks, but I am going to try the ceramic recipes once I have a functioning printer again.

Re: inkjet liquid formulations for metals/ceramics

Posted: Tue Aug 28, 2018 12:32 pm
by 3dprinter
Thank you very much for your input and the information.

The general idea is to indirectly print metal or ceramics and sinter them after printing. Therefore the liquid formulation can get rather complex since it has to bind the powder and ideally not leave a lot of residue after sintering.

As far as I can tell there are generally two solutions. Using an aqueous liquid and fill them with some binder polymers like PEG, DEG or in your stated case sugars and cure/dry the parts during and after printing. The other solution might be using UV curable ink and cure each layer after printing? I'm not sure whether UV curable ink is even suitable for this case.

Re: inkjet liquid formulations for metals/ceramics

Posted: Wed Aug 29, 2018 5:54 am
by dragonator
When printing sand casting molds I seem to recall professional printers printing in sand using furan resin. That also seems to be common for all sand casting in general. I would not know if the same resign would be usable in other materials or what the properties are. I do suspect Furan resin can simply be printed with thermal inkjet, and don't require piezo inkjet.

I have not yet heard of printing in to be sintered powders with UV resin, but I am far from an expert in this field.

Re: inkjet liquid formulations for metals/ceramics

Posted: Mon Nov 12, 2018 10:28 am
by bigbomber
dragonator wrote: Wed Aug 29, 2018 5:54 am When printing sand casting molds I seem to recall professional printers printing in sand using furan resin. That also seems to be common for all sand casting in general. I would not know if the same resign would be usable in other materials or what the properties are. I do suspect Furan resin can simply be printed with thermal inkjet, and don't require piezo inkjet.

I have not yet heard of printing in to be sintered powders with UV resin, but I am far from an expert in this field.
I'm a mechanical engineer and know electronics well. I'm very interested about 3d printing of sand molds for foundry and casting. please share your experiments. thank you a lot.
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