NACAM42 Formlabs is releasing a reprocessor with their SLS Printer so that you can reuse the support material that was brushed off. There is a video on tested about the whole thing, but the cost of the machine, reprocessor and cleaning station is about $20,000USD if I remember correctly.
Another issue with SLS is that any parts that are manifold have to be 100% infill. If you want larger parts that are light or use less material then a large enough hole has to be designed into the part to let unused material escape.
iPeel aaand with something like a new cura infill you can just drain whole thing out with one hole as its constructed in a way that allows you to do that.
This isn't a significant drawback though, and it's not unique to SLS printing. Any small pinhole will do to evacuate the material, and if you make any closed cavity with any print method, you WILL have trapped material inside, with resin printing, it's air and resin, with laser sintering it's sintering media, and with extrusion printing, it's loose filament strings and air.
Well the video at 2:34 seems to show the powder clumping and sticking to the model pretty significantly. The person in the video is using a brush to free the powder from the actual model. So a semi hollow enclosed model could be a problem freeing up the internal powder. Yes resin needs to be drained but the remaining resin is still in liquid form so no problem.
Material usage is probably not too much of an issue, considering you can only go up to 50% reused material. So the ideal amount of material used is 50% or more.
@@operator8014 air isn't "loose material", and loose filament strings don't get trapped as a necessity of the technology. Even you do get some filament trapped it certainly doesn't fill the entire cavity.
I always love how honest and real your reviews are. SLS printing does look good for businesses, but that mess and cost doesn't look practical for normal people. Thank you for all the great videos.
In my mind, SLS = Metal sintering for some reason. When I heard it was nylon, I was a little bit surprised, especially given how the material seems to be just powdered plastic.
Yep, between the much higher printer and materials costs, the dodgy dimensional stability, plus the added 'mess' potential for both SLA and SLS, currently not seeing a 'yuge' advantage over nylon FDM.
Me too. The cheapest metal sintering machines go for $20,000. But you will need a binder removal machine and an oven for sintering. No real cheap solutions yet for metal but I suspect it's coming soon. It will be a revolution when it does.
Dear Angus, i work at an institute in germany and we can regenerate the heat deflected pa12 sls-material from the build chamber and reuse it for one time. So our Partner, a company can offer the half of the price for the Material. We also have better material properties than the original material. You also forgot the Sintratec S1 from switzerland. We will get one next week. If you are interested, i can send you a Feedback. But nice video, you hit a lot of facts and the answer why they use black material is also correct. I give a thumbs up ;)
Sls Nylon is very strong and can detail your prints very exactly without leaving a mark, but I think sls for now is way to expensive to be considered for now on. I always like to check on 3dhubs for the types of plastic but my favorite one so far is ABS or SLA because of the lower cost and the smoothness of the plastic
Oh I did not notice you were make anything, I love your channel and your cool guy video. Why won't you create a discord server for your channel? I think it is a pretty cool idea for users to share their prints with other experienced users.
The Geeetech MeCreator I've played around with a little bit, not a huge fan so far. I also need to start printing with the Tarantula, I've only done a benchy for now. It does seem promising for the price, but I'd tend to recommend spending another $100 for a range of printers that are quite a bit better.
I think you are genuently the only youtuber who really goes in depth for all your videos, at least in 3d printing. No better source of trustwothy info than MakersMuse
Small volume, affordable, metal sintering machines, even if they are slow, will be something to keep an eye out for too now that these techs are patent free. It's one of the few processes that can actually produce descent metal parts. SLA or FFF(FDM) can't do these in any iteration of the technology. But it'll be good to see these nylon printing machines showing up on 3d hubs and the like by dedicated home users as an option.
high speed sintering will a day replace sls but only for plastics for the first time, the unused powder is 100 % reusable because the chamber isn't heated and the printer is 10 times faster. ruclips.net/video/2jiPUORBu8Q/видео.html
Very well articulated and well rounded presentation, and summary, like how you cover the technical aspects and facts, and bring it back into simple relative terms, and not get lost in the jargon, thank you! :)
high speed sintering is the future, the unused powder isn't sintered and the part can be easily pulled out the powder bed. the unused powder is also 100% reusable and the system is 10 times faster.
I think the problem with SLS is that the heat create with the laser dissipate too fast because the laser melt a tiny surface so you need to heat the chamber. I think future SLS will don't have this problem with more powerful lasers.
It's also a problem of electricity consumption, if you melt 1X10kg of a matter you need less power than if you melt 100X 100g of the same matter because the more the part is tiny the faster it cooled and you need an amount of energy to keep it melted. so to melt a part single voxel per single voxel you need too much electricity, to heat the chamber solve half the problem.
Great video Angus, the fact you mentioned the powder product shouldn't be handled in a closed residential environment is very important, keep up the great content and be safe !
There is no single 3D print tech that will be “the future”, same as there’s no single traditional manufacturing process that “won”. And there will surely be even more processes as the tech evolves.
@@MrGTAmodsgerman Truthfully the future is not good. People are simply too stupid; they keep fixing what ain't broke. The lust for something "new" is the extinction of humanity. There is nothing new, everything has been done already; now we must choose the most efficient road and stay on it.
It's the granddaddy of printing. Also used in metals (under different power and powder requirements). I think they even used parts in aerospace that were done in 3D printing (metal, not the ratchet key from the space station).
My bet is that SLS and SLA is the future for 3d printing based production. FDM will always remain the king of hobbyists and prototyping. Simply because it’s so much easier, safer, cheaper, and least difficult to use. The limitations and complexity of SLA and SLS are minimized by industrial production where many parts are made in batches, especially things such as metal part sintering. The production of the strongest 3D printed parts benefits from economies of scale, especially so when furnaces and potentially hazardous fumes and materials come into play. FDM can be done at such a small scale and with such ease that anyone interested in the hobby or using 3d printing in a practical home application will inevitably come to it as the best all around option. Because this group will make up the vast majority of users it means FDM will remain king. At least until self forming materials come into play, but we’re at least twenty years out from that.
You act like this shirt was some kind of insult bravely worn in front of the masses. It's a fuckin' shirt and it's not even that bad. Not my style nor do I see anything wrong with wearing it.
I work in a plating shop dealing with SLS parts, surface density is critical for post processing and you lose that surface density when building thin walled parts. I’ve noticed that shapeways uses lowered density parts to deal with this issue. If you get parts from them, you will need to sand and pick at them to get rid of this. Also a resin coating or primer will help you with cleaning this up, if you don’t have a sand blaster. Definitely would recommend a dusk mask, that would handle the finest particles
The difference in color is due to the material manufacturer, EOS uses white, which is the base color of the powder that usually is issued by BASF. To correct you as well, the cooling down process of a chamber depends on the building time of the print, if a print is 30 hours long, it will take 15 hours to cool down, so pretty much the half the time of printing. The shrinkage is manageable, all can be adjusted on the program provided PSW or MAGICS when preparing the platform.
I have access to an SLS printer. It's expensive, but it's worth it. The outcome is crazy. The level of detail it can produce is a lot better than my 3d printer
So we had a 100% price drop in 2 years for SLS. Maybe one magnitude more and we are in the hobby sector. But what about other, power based system, like sandstone - it does not require much heating during the process but needs support in some occasions. .the post processing has extra steps like firing it, glueing and firing again. But some makers or artist who work with clay own a oven. I finished my project on 3D printing yesterday by giving the talk at school. I want to thank you, as you were a good source for information, help and entertainment during the process.
I agree with you that SLS is definitely the best (and my favorite) form of additive manufacturing. With the strength, volume, and materials that can be used it's certainly a staple in the industrial 3d printing world. As for home use, I don't think it will ever be a viable option for a hobbyist unless they were using it for a business of some sort. SLA and DLP systems are a bit more home friendly, but with the mess of resins and such they definitely have a niche market as well. The video was great as well, and sure to spark a lot of good discussion.
Takeaway for me is basically if you need SLS parts you use a service bureau like Shapeways. For other stuff can use a home printer. Metal would be cool but I don't see that becoming a less than $5000 home/small business system for a long time.
SLS may be not only the future of printing, it is also the past. When I saw the first 3D printed parts, way more than 20 years ago, on tv or industrial fair, metal or plastic, they where SLS printed. And thank you for this detailed explanation. When seen on tv or web clips, they never show the whole process. allways thought it would be much simpler and dreamed of sometimes own one by myself.
A couple of stands over from ours at TCT, there was a company doing a clean-out of their SLS printer during the end of show break-down - I should have photographed it - the guy was in a full head-to-toe 'bunny suit', complete with overboots, a full-face breathing mask system, and was connected to the machine via an antistatic strap. I'm guessing that dust gets everywhere, and the particle size makes it a possible fire/explosion hazard (the antistatic strap) under the wrong circumstances.
I imagine the antistatic is as much to prevent him getting a static charge and getting covered by dust from head to toe than anything else. But yeah, that powder has to be horribly messy.
I worked for EOS and we used 60% used with 40% new powder for PA12. The prints were perfect. Even higher amounts of used powder are possible, but the necessary parameters aren't known yet.
Hi Angus. Haven't seen you down at the brewery for the past couple of weeks! Just one point I'll make on this video. Printing successfully with 100% virgin powder is almost impossible. What you'll find is that the higher the virgin powder, the better the defenition, however, the more the virgin powder, the more the warping/deformation. Pure virgin will warp at 1cm^2 layers. I print at 20% virgin with a new type powder. This provides a good compromise between warping and part quality. I warm up the powder to a point just under the glass transition temperature. Cooling is such a slow process. In ideal circumstances I allow twice the build time for cooling. Thanks for the awesome videos. I owe you a beer next time I see you.
I would say that the shrinkage isn't a huge problem. I designed fixtures that locates parts on vacuumformed parts and those SLS prints are pretty much spot on the toolside of the vacuumformed part. Which kinda says it isn't far off :)
Thanks for the update always good to know where the 3D printing world is going. As you say to much cost and mess at the moment, so we will stay clear for now.
SLS just happens to be the name of a rocket that fell to the beast of sunk cost, and never made it off the launchpad. I mean, it might take off next year, but it's dubious.
Great video, I hadn’t actually heard of SLS before and this seems like a great breakdown of the concept. On a related note, have you tried sandblasting as a clean up technique on PLA prints?
We have about 10 of the large EOS SLS printers at my Company printing in mostly stainless steel. They are excellent printers and create some very impressive parts with a very high levels of detail, ( they should for £1000,000 per machine with the powder recovery system). I have a little FDM printer at home that i use for my personal use, they wont let us print anything personal or fun on the EOS printers because of cost and time.
I love the precision of it... (a good portion of my potential uses for a 3d printer require rather high precision) And the idea you could dye the white stuff... But the cost and mess of it! Ouch!
HP's Multi Jet Fusion technology also uses Nylon Pa12 material and barely creates any waste powder, same goes for binder jetting. Have you looked into that? In addition to that, generally all powder based parts have to be sand blasted just to clean them, so there no way around. However, depending on the blasting media (glass beads, nut shells, graphite) you can achieve various types of finishes.
I Have seen the HP MJF in person. Seems very promising and innovative. There is 2 or 3 different types of materials available right now, (nylon, something "glassy"like, the a more flexible one.) I asked about ABS, but the machine does not get to a high enough temperature for it. A user pretty much needs to use both a printer and their post processing station. The Post processing station is built to cool the print in a controlled manner, and is said to mostly eliminate shrinkage.
I work with MJF. It is fast and creates close to isotropic parts. However, the speed and strength comes at higher materials costs compared to SLS. You need the powder and two agents which are very pricy. Under full load you can run through 4-5k$ in materials per week which means that you could end up paying the machine's price per year just in consumables. Tolerances of 200 microns are not great either but it is one of the most promising technology platforms out there at this stage.
I think that 5 axis 3D printers is the future. A 3D extrusion printer that can rotate the print at every axis can also do without support material. In addition it could also be used to lay down complex patterns of continuous carbon fibers for reinforcement. You should do a show on the future of 5 axis printers.
Whoever is the first company to make adjustable-size sls printers is going to be wildly successful. Imagine dropping in a new print bed so you don't have to use too much extra powder. :-) Well, we probably have 5+ years before we get these at home. I'll live with my fdm for now.
I build dioramas as a hobby ..looking for a system to print 1/35 scale figures ....SLS is a no go for me...SLA printer is something I'm considering. ...possibly selling a few figures at some point ...been watching the prices and I believe an SLA is for me.....thank you for your informative videos I enjoy watching n learning......
The material re-usage increases when everything is sintered in close to absolute void of air. As you stated, plastics may absorb humidity, but in void they can't. Also, when unpacking, you should not touch anything and, most importantly, keep the dust in the chamber. Plastics fortunately can be captured with electrostatic charged walls of a container, thus otherwise problematic issues will not even arise. The price tag has been lowered by quite a bit and I am also surprised that a 10 W laser suffices. I suppose that's the power output, not the consumption. And yes, the shrinking. The systems I know have laser sensors which measure the material thickness and adjust the material appliance accordingly. This is even a greater issue with metal prints, because they may crack up to quite some extent.
I am likely to get a Fuse for my business, but I agree with the home stuff, and that is why i think the 3d printing business won't become outdated by home makers just yet. I am looking forward to metal SLS and SLM that is cost effective too since the patents are running out on them too. £1-2mil for one is a little much for me even as a small business to get into.
The different colours are due to the wavelength of the lasers used. The expensive EOS machines use high powered CO2 lasers operates in the 10.6 um wavelength, PA12 absorbs well in that range, downside is the laser system is expensive and takes up a lot of space. The desktop SLS machines use a compact, low cost, laser diode, operates @ 405 nm, powders need to be black in colour to absorb at this wavelength. So the desktop systems use PA12 blended with carbon black.
I don't think that it'll beat FDM any time soon (especially not in the hobby scene) but metal powder sintering machines, if they ever become consumer friendly, would be amazing because nothing else can really print metal
That said, if you make full use of the build volume (basically, plan your printing sessions so you can fill the chamber with prints, rather than trying to do one at a time), you can largely mitigate the problem of wasted powder...
If they changed there chamber design so that it could be sized to item you are printing then they could cut down on the waisted powder. Must be a way to do that. Great video, lots of information !
@makersmuse there is a company voxeljet that produces parts for "investment casting" and they use binder to glue plastic powder together. similar to ink-jet printers with added z axis!
One correction: SLS nylon parts can often be stronger than injection molded nylon. SLS nylon is PA12, while injection molded nylon is usually PA6 or PA66 and the SLS process allows more complete crystallization, both of which increase strength. However, that makes them more brittle both because of the increased strength and because of gaps left by partially melted material at the interface of each layer. This has been shown by a few different university labs
This would be nice for hackerspaces. A couple people could request a part, and they'll all print their parts at the same time to fully utilize the x-y space.
I can’t wait until more machines come out that can be purchased for lower prices. As a hobbyist, 10,000 bucks is really high to buy for just personal use.
Also, check out the Sintratec Kit. (see web site) I am a hobbyist and I just had to have an early affordable SLS. It has a very modest build volume of 11x11x11 and retails for 5.5K (I think) The kit went together quite smoothly - over a solid six days. I learned a lot about SLS by building it and found it quite enjoyable. From a home user perspective, It is everything you say - very messy, a heavy waste of powder if you don't fill the volume with parts - I think they claim 50% reuse - you really need to be setup to sort and remix in your virgin powder. I'm getting a sandblaster and have found the surface really needs a scrubbing for that extra quality. (they include a dust vacuum and electric scrubber - toothbrush?) Only the kit is available in the US - I think there are laser power import issues, but I'm not sure. They are very helpful and nice to work with when I have had challenges. I can nail the X/Y dimensional accuracy with galvo adjustment, and the Z is a little more straight forward (it was fine off the bat). It does build strong parts! I am still going through a few learning experiences as I try to push the limits a bit - my current challenge is trying to print chain-mail. There are tons of thermal things to consider. Due to some combination of user error, settings and plain old machine capability i haven't yet been able to make a nice mat of flexible mail that doesn't have a solid area in the middle of it. Anyway, I am still having fun and have no regrets.
BASF has a 316L stainless steel infused filament (about $400-500 US), that can be printed on most typical (CRS10 for example). You print (high width to height ratio design is best, 100% infill), send it off to de bind and sinter. Very, very, cool. Can be bought from MatterHackers).
This review makes it so much easier to know when to use this technology. Its like ink jet printers, awesome for some applications but overly expensive and too delicate prints for others.
I use EOS machines for metal DMLS at work, and they are pretty awesome, but obviously expensive. Compared to other DMLS machines I’ve used though, they’re definitely the most reliable
Fascinating technology. Ideally, the technology needs to evolve such that only part of the chamber is filled with powder and some kind of dam is sintered at each layer to keep the powder only in the area that is used. Selective Laser Sintering with Selective Powder Deposition. lol
Lots of good information on SLS there. Parts I've had done look great, not so great for working/structural parts though. And if you have hollows they can be troublesome to clean out and if left uncleaned you get powder coming out over time.
I think this is also the case with Multijet fusion of HP. I've also observed the quality degrades as I reuse the powder. Although it has high reusability ratio, it doesn't guarantee you the output's quality especially when the powder has turned yellowish.
I thought that I was going to see why SLS will be the future of 3D printing, but not one comment was made in its favor. Initial cost of machine, powder cost, shrinkage, high absorbing nylon, little reusability, unrecyclable, small build chamber, not consumer friendly, extremely messy, and respiratory hazard (cancer?), and I believe the point was made to keep my FDM machine and my money. Thanks for the information!
Material costs 5x as much as FDM, most of it is wasted, you can't do hollow internal spaces, can't do multiple materials in the same print, and it takes many times longer to print? Doesn't sound like the future to me. Now if someone comes out with a sub-5K SLS metal printer, that will be a big deal. But even then, it will have to achieve better detail and strength than sintered Filamet.
It will probably find it's (rather big) niche in vintage car repair - it's most likely the best technology to make durable replacement plastic parts at a reasonable price point.
Very good video, full of great info; thanks that! It's nice to see how 3d printing is improving more and more. The market is still quite fragmented (same with VR at this moment) and until it standardizes, the prices are gonna be prohibitive for the regular Joe. But leaving that out, as long as plastic is so expensive I don't see them becoming a mainstream product. I remember when we all used to have one or two regular 2D printers at home. Now a cartridge is more expensive than a brand new machine.
Not that it really matters, but as a point of clarity, EOS did not invent selective laser sintering. It was a company called DTM in Austin Texas. They were eventually bought out by 3-D systems.
I can't wait to see what they come out with over the next few years, would love to have sls at home after they fix the drawbacks. Thanks for sharing and as always Keep Building👍
The inability to reuse powder is probably why shapeways does the reorganizing of all parts so that they have very little powder at the end that can't be reused. More intertwined parts, more profit.
Shrinkage is not an issue in Nylon SLS. You fully sinter in the material. SLS shrinkage applies to green parts for molding only. That's due to the glue material sintered out of the green part in sinter oven process for the final melting stage. In Nylon SLS you directly melt the part. Warping is an issue. Dust on the glass, temperature control issues in the process and chunks of recycled powder cause stiffness issues. So it's hard to get reliable functional parts from a machine. So stuff could not be critical non fail parts of any product. They will unexpectedly fail at random. It's no issue to use 100% recycled powder. Only virgin powder will give you more control over strenght of parts. Proper multiple sifting and drying the powder from taking up moisture from the air is key. Adding fresh powder doesn't truly give you an advantage over better handling of the material. pretty much like drying PLA in your oven. You can easily build yourself a blasting chamber, powder sieve machine and use a shop vac to handle material. Sandblasting is just the easiest way to depowder the parts from loose or slightly attached powder.
Seriously, you think people are going to spend all that time getting all the powder off ? Theres a reason FDM printing became popular and its because with PLA its non toxic and low mess.
The powder removal doesn't have to take a lot of time. Drop the block of used powder in a bag, gently slosh it around, then blow off a tiny bit of remaining powder with your shop vac blower. Removing support material takes vastly longer. It's all just the mentality, and what you're okay with doing. I don't detail my 3D prints, I use them for functional things.
I've seen sls printer that has the first stage cleaning built in, two armports in the case, and an vacuum hose inside. glove up, vacuum the remaining build material (avoids contamination with dust and other particles as well). And then take the part out for final rinsing. avoids quite a bit of the mess.
I'm currently working on an open source slm design. With all the powder handling automated and full melt I believe I will get better material properties and more material options. (Using color spectrometer and machine vision to calibrate settings for different materials).
Overall a nice review although some important errors. SLS was invented by DTM, Texas who were taken over by 3D Systems. EOS were not the original or the inventor, in fact there were years of court cases between the two companies. White SLS is not naturally white, it has Titanium Dioxide added to make it white. The aged yellow is actually its natural colour. The powder is pretty inert and tests have shown that it isn't harmful to humans, the particles are large enough to be ingested rather than going into your lungs. Saying that i would never work a machine without PPE. Finally the reason the cheaper machines use non-white powders is not to do with laser power but to do with the laser frequency.
Sls is how the wow models of your character was made. I forget what the company was called. Damn they was expensive tho. I believe the patents are theirs.
That price per KG is nuts. I cannot see this taking off for the hobbyist or even small companies till that goes way down.
That's the main reason I don't want one yet. Maybe if someone came up with a "re-processor" or something like that.
That price is ridiculous compared to industrial printers too. I pay 60 a kilo for my labs large machines
JTWorks funny thing is form labs prices are 1/10 of what they used to be 🤔
Also the fuse one is the top of the line there other printer is 3500
ProCreeper 2000 while I totally agree with you - the results do speak for themselves in quality.
NACAM42 Formlabs is releasing a reprocessor with their SLS Printer so that you can reuse the support material that was brushed off. There is a video on tested about the whole thing, but the cost of the machine, reprocessor and cleaning station is about $20,000USD if I remember correctly.
Another issue with SLS is that any parts that are manifold have to be 100% infill. If you want larger parts that are light or use less material then a large enough hole has to be designed into the part to let unused material escape.
iPeel aaand with something like a new cura infill you can just drain whole thing out with one hole as its constructed in a way that allows you to do that.
This isn't a significant drawback though, and it's not unique to SLS printing. Any small pinhole will do to evacuate the material, and if you make any closed cavity with any print method, you WILL have trapped material inside, with resin printing, it's air and resin, with laser sintering it's sintering media, and with extrusion printing, it's loose filament strings and air.
Well the video at 2:34 seems to show the powder clumping and sticking to the model pretty significantly. The person in the video is using a brush to free the powder from the actual model. So a semi hollow enclosed model could be a problem freeing up the internal powder. Yes resin needs to be drained but the remaining resin is still in liquid form so no problem.
Material usage is probably not too much of an issue, considering you can only go up to 50% reused material. So the ideal amount of material used is 50% or more.
@@operator8014 air isn't "loose material", and loose filament strings don't get trapped as a necessity of the technology. Even you do get some filament trapped it certainly doesn't fill the entire cavity.
I always love how honest and real your reviews are. SLS printing does look good for businesses, but that mess and cost doesn't look practical for normal people. Thank you for all the great videos.
Starting the video: "I'm also going to crush some hopes and dreams in the process." He just smiles, unashamed.
It's what we do around here ;)
In my mind, SLS = Metal sintering for some reason. When I heard it was nylon, I was a little bit surprised, especially given how the material seems to be just powdered plastic.
Yep, between the much higher printer and materials costs, the dodgy dimensional stability, plus the added 'mess' potential for both SLA and SLS, currently not seeing a 'yuge' advantage over nylon FDM.
In my mind SLS = space launch system
Me too. The cheapest metal sintering machines go for $20,000. But you will need a binder removal machine and an oven for sintering. No real cheap solutions yet for metal but I suspect it's coming soon. It will be a revolution when it does.
Well, there is DMLS (Direct Metal Laser Sintering)
Dear Angus, i work at an institute in germany and we can regenerate the heat deflected pa12 sls-material from the build chamber and reuse it for one time. So our Partner, a company can offer the half of the price for the Material. We also have better material properties than the original material.
You also forgot the Sintratec S1 from switzerland. We will get one next week. If you are interested, i can send you a Feedback.
But nice video, you hit a lot of facts and the answer why they use black material is also correct. I give a thumbs up ;)
I would also like this information please.
Barely having worked with SLS, this was very informative. Thanks!
Sls Nylon is very strong and can detail your prints very exactly without leaving a mark, but I think sls for now is way to expensive to be considered for now on. I always like to check on 3dhubs for the types of plastic but my favorite one so far is ABS or SLA because of the lower cost and the smoothness of the plastic
Oh I did not notice you were make anything, I love your channel and your cool guy video. Why won't you create a discord server for your channel? I think it is a pretty cool idea for users to share their prints with other experienced users.
mopmop111 thanks! I made a subreddit instead. You can post prints or just about anything at r/makeanything 😊
I just saw your review on the tevo tornado, awesome! but what do you think of the tarantula or the geeetech printer series?
The Geeetech MeCreator I've played around with a little bit, not a huge fan so far. I also need to start printing with the Tarantula, I've only done a benchy for now. It does seem promising for the price, but I'd tend to recommend spending another $100 for a range of printers that are quite a bit better.
That's the best explanation of SLS, well done Angus!!
Thats no cube!
hecadecahyperhedron
120-cell is a little easier to say.
But explaining the fourth dimension might have lost a few viewers lol
thats a space station!
I just came in to read the actual name of that geometry.
I think you are genuently the only youtuber who really goes in depth for all your videos, at least in 3d printing. No better source of trustwothy info than MakersMuse
You film is the most informative material about this technology for a home maker, I have ever seen. Thank you!
Small volume, affordable, metal sintering machines, even if they are slow, will be something to keep an eye out for too now that these techs are patent free.
It's one of the few processes that can actually produce descent metal parts. SLA or FFF(FDM) can't do these in any iteration of the technology.
But it'll be good to see these nylon printing machines showing up on 3d hubs and the like by dedicated home users as an option.
high speed sintering will a day replace sls but only for plastics for the first time, the unused powder is 100 % reusable because the chamber isn't heated and the printer is 10 times faster.
ruclips.net/video/2jiPUORBu8Q/видео.html
bye the way i like your slow motion videos
Man, the tolerance test and book were extremely impressive. The precision of SLS makes your tolerance test look useless!
Needs to go even finer!
Always... Until then, I'll just keep fine tuning my FDM :)
Prime Technophilia+ the fineness will always be limited by the powder particle size
Copier toner seems to have all the right qualities, if you don't mind an instant case of black lung disease.
Model: stereographic projection of a hyperdodecahedron
Muse: "cube"
Me: wut?
Very well articulated and well rounded presentation, and summary, like how you cover the technical aspects and facts, and bring it back into simple relative terms, and not get lost in the jargon, thank you! :)
You've convinced me that SLS is not the wave of the future.
high speed sintering is the future, the unused powder isn't sintered and the part can be easily pulled out the powder bed. the unused powder is also 100% reusable and the system is 10 times faster.
John theux I agree sintering powder is reusable in the normal sintering process but not so when using SLS.
I think the problem with SLS is that the heat create with the laser dissipate too fast because the laser melt a tiny surface so you need to heat the chamber. I think future SLS will don't have this problem with more powerful lasers.
It's also a problem of electricity consumption, if you melt 1X10kg of a matter you need less power than if you melt 100X 100g of the same matter because the more the part is tiny the faster it cooled and you need an amount of energy to keep it melted. so to melt a part single voxel per single voxel you need too much electricity, to heat the chamber solve half the problem.
It's the best system to 3D print metal, useable parts or tools. SLA or FDR is still mostly for toys and gadgets.
Great video Angus, the fact you mentioned the powder product shouldn't be handled in a closed residential environment is very important, keep up the great content and be safe !
I seriously thought FDM stood for
Filament Dispensing Machine. Thank you Angus. You saved me from embarrassment at a local gathering.
Wow, I had no idea about the lack of full reusability of the powder. Great information to know before buying such an expensive machine.
Cubes have evolved since my time.
There is no single 3D print tech that will be “the future”, same as there’s no single traditional manufacturing process that “won”.
And there will surely be even more processes as the tech evolves.
So what is the future?
@@MrGTAmodsgerman Truthfully the future is not good. People are simply too stupid; they keep fixing what ain't broke. The lust for something "new" is the extinction of humanity. There is nothing new, everything has been done already; now we must choose the most efficient road and stay on it.
I’ve never even heard of SLS before now. Great video!
It's the granddaddy of printing. Also used in metals (under different power and powder requirements). I think they even used parts in aerospace that were done in 3D printing (metal, not the ratchet key from the space station).
aserta wow that’s crazy! Thanks for the info!
My bet is that SLS and SLA is the future for 3d printing based production. FDM will always remain the king of hobbyists and prototyping. Simply because it’s so much easier, safer, cheaper, and least difficult to use. The limitations and complexity of SLA and SLS are minimized by industrial production where many parts are made in batches, especially things such as metal part sintering. The production of the strongest 3D printed parts benefits from economies of scale, especially so when furnaces and potentially hazardous fumes and materials come into play.
FDM can be done at such a small scale and with such ease that anyone interested in the hobby or using 3d printing in a practical home application will inevitably come to it as the best all around option. Because this group will make up the vast majority of users it means FDM will remain king. At least until self forming materials come into play, but we’re at least twenty years out from that.
May I take this opportunity to commend you on your bravery for wearing that shirt ;P
I'm not brave, I just don't care :)
I kinda like the shirt tbh
hes pulling it out tough
@@MakersMuse I like the shirt and Love the attitude!
You act like this shirt was some kind of insult bravely worn in front of the masses. It's a fuckin' shirt and it's not even that bad. Not my style nor do I see anything wrong with wearing it.
I work in a plating shop dealing with SLS parts, surface density is critical for post processing and you lose that surface density when building thin walled parts. I’ve noticed that shapeways uses lowered density parts to deal with this issue. If you get parts from them, you will need to sand and pick at them to get rid of this. Also a resin coating or primer will help you with cleaning this up, if you don’t have a sand blaster. Definitely would recommend a dusk mask, that would handle the finest particles
From experience FDM printed Nylon is a lot tougher than SLS Nylon.
Did not know about the issues with reusing the powder, that is very interesting and inconvenient . Thanks for explaining it
The difference in color is due to the material manufacturer, EOS uses white, which is the base color of the powder that usually is issued by BASF. To correct you as well, the cooling down process of a chamber depends on the building time of the print, if a print is 30 hours long, it will take 15 hours to cool down, so pretty much the half the time of printing. The shrinkage is manageable, all can be adjusted on the program provided PSW or MAGICS when preparing the platform.
I have access to an SLS printer. It's expensive, but it's worth it. The outcome is crazy. The level of detail it can produce is a lot better than my 3d printer
So we had a 100% price drop in 2 years for SLS.
Maybe one magnitude more and we are in the hobby sector.
But what about other, power based system, like sandstone - it does not require much heating during the process but needs support in some occasions.
.the post processing has extra steps like firing it, glueing and firing again. But some makers or artist who work with clay own a oven.
I finished my project on 3D printing yesterday by giving the talk at school. I want to thank you, as you were a good source for information, help and entertainment during the process.
I agree with you that SLS is definitely the best (and my favorite) form of additive manufacturing. With the strength, volume, and materials that can be used it's certainly a staple in the industrial 3d printing world. As for home use, I don't think it will ever be a viable option for a hobbyist unless they were using it for a business of some sort. SLA and DLP systems are a bit more home friendly, but with the mess of resins and such they definitely have a niche market as well. The video was great as well, and sure to spark a lot of good discussion.
Takeaway for me is basically if you need SLS parts you use a service bureau like Shapeways. For other stuff can use a home printer. Metal would be cool but I don't see that becoming a less than $5000 home/small business system for a long time.
SLS may be not only the future of printing, it is also the past. When I saw the first 3D printed parts, way more than 20 years ago, on tv or industrial fair, metal or plastic, they where SLS printed. And thank you for this detailed explanation. When seen on tv or web clips, they never show the whole process. allways thought it would be much simpler and dreamed of sometimes own one by myself.
For Commercial? Possibly. But not for consumer 3D printing. At least that's my idea.
A couple of stands over from ours at TCT, there was a company doing a clean-out of their SLS printer during the end of show break-down - I should have photographed it - the guy was in a full head-to-toe 'bunny suit', complete with overboots, a full-face breathing mask system, and was connected to the machine via an antistatic strap.
I'm guessing that dust gets everywhere, and the particle size makes it a possible fire/explosion hazard (the antistatic strap) under the wrong circumstances.
I imagine the antistatic is as much to prevent him getting a static charge and getting covered by dust from head to toe than anything else. But yeah, that powder has to be horribly messy.
This is SLS... And This is A SUPER DISTRACTING SHIRT...
I worked for EOS and we used 60% used with 40% new powder for PA12. The prints were perfect. Even higher amounts of used powder are possible, but the necessary parameters aren't known yet.
Hi Angus. Haven't seen you down at the brewery for the past couple of weeks!
Just one point I'll make on this video. Printing successfully with 100% virgin powder is almost impossible. What you'll find is that the higher the virgin powder, the better the defenition, however, the more the virgin powder, the more the warping/deformation. Pure virgin will warp at 1cm^2 layers. I print at 20% virgin with a new type powder. This provides a good compromise between warping and part quality. I warm up the powder to a point just under the glass transition temperature. Cooling is such a slow process. In ideal circumstances I allow twice the build time for cooling.
Thanks for the awesome videos. I owe you a beer next time I see you.
That “cube” looks good ;)
Your shirt is awesome!
Need to wear it more often :P
You should watch Curious Droid channel. That guy's shirts are so insane, he now says what the shirt is each episode!
but that shirt remind me of the spring of Mario Bros idk why
It's amazing how far the technology has come
This makes my manufacturing nerd self happy. Great video.
SLS - Seriously Loud Shirt
I would say that the shrinkage isn't a huge problem. I designed fixtures that locates parts on vacuumformed parts and those SLS prints are pretty much spot on the toolside of the vacuumformed part. Which kinda says it isn't far off :)
Thanks for the update always good to know where the 3D printing world is going. As you say to much cost and mess at the moment, so we will stay clear for now.
Paul Thomas This is not where its going. Its where it came from. Good explanatory video anyways
I meant in terms of cost and production not Origin Doh!
For metal printing this, and it's big brother SLM are the only way to go.
SLS just happens to be the name of a rocket that fell to the beast of sunk cost, and never made it off the launchpad. I mean, it might take off next year, but it's dubious.
Great video, I hadn’t actually heard of SLS before and this seems like a great breakdown of the concept.
On a related note, have you tried sandblasting as a clean up technique on PLA prints?
We have about 10 of the large EOS SLS printers at my Company printing in mostly stainless steel. They are excellent printers and create some very impressive parts with a very high levels of detail, ( they should for £1000,000 per machine with the powder recovery system). I have a little FDM printer at home that i use for my personal use, they wont let us print anything personal or fun on the EOS printers because of cost and time.
I love the precision of it...
(a good portion of my potential uses for a 3d printer require rather high precision)
And the idea you could dye the white stuff...
But the cost and mess of it! Ouch!
The powder is a disjoined support. Excellent
HP's Multi Jet Fusion technology also uses Nylon Pa12 material and barely creates any waste powder, same goes for binder jetting. Have you looked into that? In addition to that, generally all powder based parts have to be sand blasted just to clean them, so there no way around. However, depending on the blasting media (glass beads, nut shells, graphite) you can achieve various types of finishes.
I Have seen the HP MJF in person. Seems very promising and innovative. There is 2 or 3 different types of materials available right now, (nylon, something "glassy"like, the a more flexible one.) I asked about ABS, but the machine does not get to a high enough temperature for it. A user pretty much needs to use both a printer and their post processing station. The Post processing station is built to cool the print in a controlled manner, and is said to mostly eliminate shrinkage.
I work with MJF. It is fast and creates close to isotropic parts. However, the speed and strength comes at higher materials costs compared to SLS. You need the powder and two agents which are very pricy. Under full load you can run through 4-5k$ in materials per week which means that you could end up paying the machine's price per year just in consumables. Tolerances of 200 microns are not great either but it is one of the most promising technology platforms out there at this stage.
My guess is you are using the MJF, the post-processing station, 1+ build units, and a sandblaster as that is what HP used during the demo? :-)
yeah that's the minimum equipment required
IIRC years ago, the first 3D printer I read about in development was SLS.
I think that 5 axis 3D printers is the future. A 3D extrusion printer that can rotate the print at every axis can also do without support material. In addition it could also be used to lay down complex patterns of continuous carbon fibers for reinforcement. You should do a show on the future of 5 axis printers.
Whoever is the first company to make adjustable-size sls printers is going to be wildly successful. Imagine dropping in a new print bed so you don't have to use too much extra powder. :-)
Well, we probably have 5+ years before we get these at home. I'll live with my fdm for now.
Worked with an eos M290 Metal Printer before. It is a very impressive machine creating amazing parts.
I build dioramas as a hobby ..looking for a system to print 1/35 scale figures ....SLS is a no go for me...SLA printer is something I'm considering. ...possibly selling a few figures at some point ...been watching the prices and I believe an SLA is for me.....thank you for your informative videos I enjoy watching n learning......
The material re-usage increases when everything is sintered in close to absolute void of air. As you stated, plastics may absorb humidity, but in void they can't. Also, when unpacking, you should not touch anything and, most importantly, keep the dust in the chamber. Plastics fortunately can be captured with electrostatic charged walls of a container, thus otherwise problematic issues will not even arise.
The price tag has been lowered by quite a bit and I am also surprised that a 10 W laser suffices. I suppose that's the power output, not the consumption. And yes, the shrinking. The systems I know have laser sensors which measure the material thickness and adjust the material appliance accordingly. This is even a greater issue with metal prints, because they may crack up to quite some extent.
I am likely to get a Fuse for my business, but I agree with the home stuff, and that is why i think the 3d printing business won't become outdated by home makers just yet. I am looking forward to metal SLS and SLM that is cost effective too since the patents are running out on them too. £1-2mil for one is a little much for me even as a small business to get into.
The different colours are due to the wavelength of the lasers used. The expensive EOS machines use high powered CO2 lasers operates in the 10.6 um wavelength, PA12 absorbs well in that range, downside is the laser system is expensive and takes up a lot of space. The desktop SLS machines use a compact, low cost, laser diode, operates @ 405 nm, powders need to be black in colour to absorb at this wavelength. So the desktop systems use PA12 blended with carbon black.
SLS was actually the first 3D printing I was aware of
Great video. Form labs told in a tested.com video that the color is because of the low power lasers.
I don't think that it'll beat FDM any time soon (especially not in the hobby scene) but metal powder sintering machines, if they ever become consumer friendly, would be amazing because nothing else can really print metal
Love the knowledge you're giving to us.
ill wait 10 years
Ill wait 20years
Great summary of the current state of play Angus! I keep having to stop myself buying a Lisa until I can deal with all the practicalities...!
Great job explaining this Angus. I also like your shirt.
Well that was a little depressing; especially the material re-use fact...
Perhaps blending the material in the blender could make it better for reuse.
Cool, my Blender models could use a blend blended in the blender
That said, if you make full use of the build volume (basically, plan your printing sessions so you can fill the chamber with prints, rather than trying to do one at a time), you can largely mitigate the problem of wasted powder...
If they changed there chamber design so that it could be sized to item you are printing then they could cut down on the waisted powder. Must be a way to do that. Great video, lots of information !
@makersmuse there is a company voxeljet that produces parts for "investment casting" and they use binder to glue plastic powder together. similar to ink-jet printers with added z axis!
One correction: SLS nylon parts can often be stronger than injection molded nylon. SLS nylon is PA12, while injection molded nylon is usually PA6 or PA66 and the SLS process allows more complete crystallization, both of which increase strength. However, that makes them more brittle both because of the increased strength and because of gaps left by partially melted material at the interface of each layer. This has been shown by a few different university labs
I've work with metal EOS printers, the price might be steep, but damn do they work like a charm
This would be nice for hackerspaces. A couple people could request a part, and they'll all print their parts at the same time to fully utilize the x-y space.
I can’t wait until more machines come out that can be purchased for lower prices. As a hobbyist, 10,000 bucks is really high to buy for just personal use.
Also, check out the Sintratec Kit. (see web site) I am a hobbyist and I just had to have an early affordable SLS. It has a very modest build volume of 11x11x11 and retails for 5.5K (I think) The kit went together quite smoothly - over a solid six days. I learned a lot about SLS by building it and found it quite enjoyable.
From a home user perspective, It is everything you say - very messy, a heavy waste of powder if you don't fill the volume with parts - I think they claim 50% reuse - you really need to be setup to sort and remix in your virgin powder. I'm getting a sandblaster and have found the surface really needs a scrubbing for that extra quality. (they include a dust vacuum and electric scrubber - toothbrush?) Only the kit is available in the US - I think there are laser power import issues, but I'm not sure.
They are very helpful and nice to work with when I have had challenges. I can nail the X/Y dimensional accuracy with galvo adjustment, and the Z is a little more straight forward (it was fine off the bat). It does build strong parts! I am still going through a few learning experiences as I try to push the limits a bit - my current challenge is trying to print chain-mail. There are tons of thermal things to consider. Due to some combination of user error, settings and plain old machine capability i haven't yet been able to make a nice mat of flexible mail that doesn't have a solid area in the middle of it. Anyway, I am still having fun and have no regrets.
BASF has a 316L stainless steel infused filament (about $400-500 US), that can be printed on most typical (CRS10 for example). You print (high width to height ratio design is best, 100% infill), send it off to de bind and sinter. Very, very, cool. Can be bought from MatterHackers).
This review makes it so much easier to know when to use this technology.
Its like ink jet printers, awesome for some applications but overly expensive
and too delicate prints for others.
I use EOS machines for metal DMLS at work, and they are pretty awesome, but obviously expensive. Compared to other DMLS machines I’ve used though, they’re definitely the most reliable
Watching this in 2020. As a hobbyist, It's still FDM vs SLA/MSLA
Fascinating technology. Ideally, the technology needs to evolve such that only part of the chamber is filled with powder and some kind of dam is sintered at each layer to keep the powder only in the area that is used. Selective Laser Sintering with Selective Powder Deposition. lol
Lots of good information on SLS there. Parts I've had done look great, not so great for working/structural parts though. And if you have hollows they can be troublesome to clean out and if left uncleaned you get powder coming out over time.
Excellent episode. Very interesting technologies that are becoming more affordable everyday for the consumer. Keep up the good work.
I think this is also the case with Multijet fusion of HP. I've also observed the quality degrades as I reuse the powder. Although it has high reusability ratio, it doesn't guarantee you the output's quality especially when the powder has turned yellowish.
I thought that I was going to see why SLS will be the future of 3D printing, but not one comment was made in its favor. Initial cost of machine, powder cost, shrinkage, high absorbing nylon, little reusability, unrecyclable, small build chamber, not consumer friendly, extremely messy, and respiratory hazard (cancer?), and I believe the point was made to keep my FDM machine and my money. Thanks for the information!
I’m convinced now that SLS will break my wallet D:
I think I’ll just now make my own out of a diode laser and some beach sand, wish me luck! :)
Material costs 5x as much as FDM, most of it is wasted, you can't do hollow internal spaces, can't do multiple materials in the same print, and it takes many times longer to print? Doesn't sound like the future to me. Now if someone comes out with a sub-5K SLS metal printer, that will be a big deal. But even then, it will have to achieve better detail and strength than sintered Filamet.
They already print titanium parts for aircraft like this.
It will probably find it's (rather big) niche in vintage car repair - it's most likely the best technology to make durable replacement plastic parts at a reasonable price point.
Fantastic explanation as always. Thanks for keeping us informed Angus.
Very good video, full of great info; thanks that!
It's nice to see how 3d printing is improving more and more. The market is still quite fragmented (same with VR at this moment) and until it standardizes, the prices are gonna be prohibitive for the regular Joe. But leaving that out, as long as plastic is so expensive I don't see them becoming a mainstream product. I remember when we all used to have one or two regular 2D printers at home. Now a cartridge is more expensive than a brand new machine.
Not that it really matters, but as a point of clarity, EOS did not invent selective laser sintering. It was a company called DTM in Austin Texas. They were eventually bought out by 3-D systems.
Isn't it wonderful how patents put a stranglehold on innovation?
Yup - we should abolish all "IP"... replace it with some sort of bounty system or something.
I can't wait to see what they come out with over the next few years, would love to have sls at home after they fix the drawbacks.
Thanks for sharing and as always Keep Building👍
Very informative Angus, thank you! I hadnt even considered the Nylon absorbing moisture even after the sintering.
The inability to reuse powder is probably why shapeways does the reorganizing of all parts so that they have very little powder at the end that can't be reused. More intertwined parts, more profit.
Shrinkage is not an issue in Nylon SLS. You fully sinter in the material. SLS shrinkage applies to green parts for molding only. That's due to the glue material sintered out of the green part in sinter oven process for the final melting stage. In Nylon SLS you directly melt the part. Warping is an issue.
Dust on the glass, temperature control issues in the process and chunks of recycled powder cause stiffness issues. So it's hard to get reliable functional parts from a machine. So stuff could not be critical non fail parts of any product. They will unexpectedly fail at random.
It's no issue to use 100% recycled powder. Only virgin powder will give you more control over strenght of parts. Proper multiple sifting and drying the powder from taking up moisture from the air is key. Adding fresh powder doesn't truly give you an advantage over better handling of the material. pretty much like drying PLA in your oven.
You can easily build yourself a blasting chamber, powder sieve machine and use a shop vac to handle material.
Sandblasting is just the easiest way to depowder the parts from loose or slightly attached powder.
We *NEED* a RUclipsr with such a printer! How about starting a GoFundMe? xD
Great video mate. A real shame about re-using powder not being viable. Maybe one day we will have materials we can use over and over?
Seriously, you think people are going to spend all that time getting all the powder off ? Theres a reason FDM printing became popular and its because with PLA its non toxic and low mess.
"This technology is NOT for home users".
Formlabs will also be releasing a cleaning station simultaneously which should make the cleaning process pretty fast.
The powder removal doesn't have to take a lot of time. Drop the block of used powder in a bag, gently slosh it around, then blow off a tiny bit of remaining powder with your shop vac blower. Removing support material takes vastly longer. It's all just the mentality, and what you're okay with doing. I don't detail my 3D prints, I use them for functional things.
I've seen sls printer that has the first stage cleaning built in, two armports in the case, and an vacuum hose inside. glove up, vacuum the remaining build material (avoids contamination with dust and other particles as well). And then take the part out for final rinsing. avoids quite a bit of the mess.
Like the idea of a combined unit!
Also using an ultrasonic cleaner after rinsing (& rinsing a 2nd time) would guarantee total removal of any powder!
I'm currently working on an open source slm design. With all the powder handling automated and full melt I believe I will get better material properties and more material options. (Using color spectrometer and machine vision to calibrate settings for different materials).
Overall a nice review although some important errors. SLS was invented by DTM, Texas who were taken over by 3D Systems. EOS were not the original or the inventor, in fact there were years of court cases between the two companies. White SLS is not naturally white, it has Titanium Dioxide added to make it white. The aged yellow is actually its natural colour. The powder is pretty inert and tests have shown that it isn't harmful to humans, the particles are large enough to be ingested rather than going into your lungs. Saying that i would never work a machine without PPE. Finally the reason the cheaper machines use non-white powders is not to do with laser power but to do with the laser frequency.
Sls is how the wow models of your character was made. I forget what the company was called. Damn they was expensive tho. I believe the patents are theirs.
Man, the first time I ever heard about a 3D printer was a SLS printer on TV roughly 7 or so years ago and a guy printed an adjustable wrench.