The world of 3D printing keeps on rolling

Getty Images

The great, not-so-late REO Speedwagon released “Roll with the Changes” during my late teens. The song has become especially meaningful over the past year or so, not only as it relates to the pandemic, politics, and the planet, but to 3D printing as well.

I consider myself fairly well-versed in additive manufacturing, but to quote one of the famous bands of my youth, the 3D printing industry continues to “turn some pages.”

This hit home for me recently while researching my latest favorite AM topic: refractory metals, which I recently wrote a blog about it.

It seems that Germany’s Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Technology and Advanced Materials has developed a new process—3D Screen Printing—that falls outside of the seven types of additive manufacturing defined by the ASTM Committee F42 standards.

It was pretty cool reading about a novel AM technology, but as it turns out, it’s not all that novel. Fraunhofer introduced it in 2016, and for whatever reason, no one has yet commercialized it (at least not that I’ve heard about. Feel free to correct me).

Because the editor of The Additive Report is a fan of all things additive, it’s entirely likely that you’ll read more about 3D Screen Printing in a future edition. For now, the Fraunhofer website explains that it uses a printable suspension of metal powder and organic binder, which is pressed through a series of computer-generated masks. There’s a hardening step between each layer, followed by heat treatment of the finished part to remove the binder and sinter the metal powder.

Except for the hardening and heat treatment steps, it sounds much like the screen printing used to make the T-shirts found at REO Speedwagon concerts. (Sidebar: I just discovered that the quinquagenarian group is on tour and playing at an arena near me in November. Maybe I’ll attend.)

As an old machinist and even older rock fan, my point is simple: New CNC machine tool designs come along every year or two, but their basic function remains the same as it has for decades—sometimes centuries.

With 3D printing, however, there’s never a same old story. There’s a constant stream of new-and-better-way-to-print-things technologies being introduced. So many, in fact, it’s hard to keep track of them all.

Rock on, additive.