14 DAY TRIAL // Even high-resolution, high-precision 3D printers have trouble making prints look as smooth and sleek as the virtual models they sprung from, but a man from the UK says he has a solution for that, and for enabling the printing of energy-conductive objects.
Stephen Mills of the United Kingdom has launched an Indiegogo campaign for “liquid plastic” filaments, an approach that is much more promising than it sounds.
A normal 3D printer based on FDM technology (fused deposition modeling) has a pretty large extruder that heats solid plastic filament or sticks.
The plastic melts upon heating, then hardens after it has been deposited in the desired shape, drop by drop. Unfortunately, nozzle sizes need to be pretty big in order for the molten plastic to flow, which causes noticeable lines and layers in all prints.
Stephen Mills' liquid filaments don't have this limitation. The plastic is held in an airtight container and hardens when exposed to air, sure enough, but the consistency can be modified based on how much solvent is put in.
So you could, technically, add enough solvent to render the plastic fluid and soft enough that it can be poured out through nozzles as small as hypodermic needles.
Thus, the layer sizes are greatly reduced, leading to a massive rise in printer resolution and, by extension, perfection of form on par with the smooth look of the 3D virtual model itself.
However, liquid plastic is just half of what Mills offers. Or, rather, “normal” plastics aren't the only thing that the man looked into when he prepared the crowd-funding campaign.
You see, he also checked out graphene and graphite, producing liquid plastics with conductive properties. Sounds like a contradiction, considering that plastic is usually a total insulator for electricity, but Mills made it happen, and for a low cost too.
Thus, we are one step closer to 3D printed electronic devices. Soon enough, we'll be seeing items as advanced as the Harvard self-assembling 3D printed lamp on every store shelf.
Indeed, we are pretty sure that Mills will raise his targeted £11,700 / $19,888 / €14,609 now that the world caught wind of his plans. He'll probably get funding for the conductive plastics alone. Even if he doesn't reach the goal, he'll receive however much is gathered, as he is using the Indiegogo “flexible funding” option.
The video embedded below has Stephen Mills explaining the crowd-funding campaign, which, by the way, is located here.
