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3D Printing

The document explains the components and materials involved in 3D printing, including the extruder, filament, electronics, and mechanics. It discusses common materials like ABS and PLA, their properties, and the printing process from design to execution. Additionally, it addresses the advantages and disadvantages of plastics, emphasizing the importance of the 3R's: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

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ADRIAN RIVAS PALACIN
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16 views2 pages

3D Printing

The document explains the components and materials involved in 3D printing, including the extruder, filament, electronics, and mechanics. It discusses common materials like ABS and PLA, their properties, and the printing process from design to execution. Additionally, it addresses the advantages and disadvantages of plastics, emphasizing the importance of the 3R's: Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle.

Uploaded by

ADRIAN RIVAS PALACIN
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as DOCX, PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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3D PRINTING

A 3D printer is a machine that can print figures with volume from a computer design. A 3D
printing machine has a lot of parts but I’m going to explain 4 of them:

The extruder: It is the part that takes the filament from the coil and deposits the exact amount
on the print bed.

The filament: Filaments used in 3D printing are thermoplastics, which are plastics that melt
when heated, can be shaped and moulded, and solidify when cooled.

The electronics: They control all the processes in the printing. They are usually Arduino
controller board and temperature sensors.

The mechanics: It includes the motors and mechanisms that move the material and deposit it
in the selected spot

MATERIALS

The most common materials for 3D printing are:

ABS: They are hard, rigid, resistant plastic. They can stand high temperatures. It has some
flexibility. It is not biodegradable but is recyclable, so we can obtain filaments coils from them.
It should be used in ventilated environments. It is used for manufacturing because it has a high
melting point.

PLA: Created from natural materials, like sugar cane. It is biodegradable it isn't toxic and it’s
used in printing. It resists to the humidity and stable to the ultraviolet radiation. It is usually
used for fast printing. Finally, they can’t stand high temperatures.

There are other types of materials, such as laybrick, laywoo-D3 or filaflex.

PROCESS

Design-We design the part we want to print. We can use programs as SketchUp, Blender or
Tinkercard.

Slicing-Slicing programs translate the STL into GCODE format, that is the format which the
printer understands. These programs determine how many layers of plastic we need to make
the design.

Printing-The GCODE file is copied to a memory card and inserted to the 3D printer. And the
computer is connected by a cable to the printer.

THE DILEMA OF PLASTICS

The advantages of plastics are:

 In house, plastics have improved the thermal insulation, which reduces the use of
other energy resources
 In transports , we use plastics in cars, planes, etc to make them lighter, so they need
less fuel to travel from a point to another.
 We also use plastics to keep our food fresh for longer periods to avoid the food wasting
and the energy required to obtain more food.
 The use of plastics has also improved the energy efficiency of household appliance.
 Finally, plastics are cheaper to obtain than other materials.

The disadvantages of plastics are:

 The main problem of plastics is its big durability


 The problem continues when the plastics are not biodegradable and take many years
to decompose
 Finally, this leads to an accumulation of plastics that pollutes the earth and ends up on
the seas, rivers and oceans, which can cause big problems.

THE 3R’S

Reduce-We can reduce the use of single-use plastics with alternative products like glass bottles
or fabric bags.

Reuse-We can find different uses for plastics. Like using plastic bottles as pots or toys and use
the food packaging as a pet feeder.

Recycle-It is an industrial process that takes place in specialised plants. They washed and dried
the plastics to create very small pieces of it, the nurdles. Recycled plastics are used to make
pipes, bags, urban furniture, etc

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