Jan 14

The Pegasus Touch Laser SLA Is A Sexy Printer That Can Build Your Hi-Res Dreams

Posted in: Today's Chili

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If you know me you know I like two things: sausage and 3D printers. While I primarily use FDM printers like Makerbot at home, I do love the quality and coherence of SLA – stereolithographic – machines. This new one, the Pegasus Touch Laser, is similar to the Form One in that it uses an inexpensive UV-cured resin to build surprisingly detailed models using laser light and a little elbow grease.

This model improves upon the average 3D printer in a few ways. First, it has a nice 7x7x9 inch build envelope and supports multiple colors of resin. It also has a built-in minicomputer and LCD that you can use to control the print as it comes out. Writes the Las Vegas-based team:

Other low cost printers transfer several gigabytes of post processed data from a tethered PC. Pegasus Touch has an on-board Linux computer that can do much of the 3D processing computation on the printer itself. Typical transfer file sizes are only a few megabytes so it never needs to be tethered to another computer.

You can see the Pegasus in action over here and pledge $2,000 to get your own printer. It’s a slightly faster print as well thanks to the group’s efforts to build a 3000mm/sec laser path. And, unlike the Form One, the Pegasus uses more logical and less obtrusive supports as it rises out of the resin bath. It will sell for $3,499 after the initial Kickstarter run.

The company calls this a sub-$2,000 SLA printer which isn’t quite true. However, given that the closest competitor goes for $3,299.00 the price is just about right for a powerful SLA machine. While I still think FDM is great for beginners and hobbyists, a nice resin-based laser printer makes me all warm and resiny inside.

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Aug 22

The Form 1 3D Printer Gets An OS X Update

Posted in: Today's Chili

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The software package that comes with the Form 1 3D printer, which I reviewed a few months ago, has gotten a much-needed update. First, the new software, called PreForm is now compatible with OS X, which means more users can use the system natively on their machines.

The new software also supports automatic mesh repair using software from NetFabb. Writes Sam Jacoby of Form Labs: “PreForm’s mesh repair tool integrates software from Netfabb to examine the triangle meshes that make up your digital design. It will automatically clean up artifacts, close triangles, and join vertices, so that your models will print reliably on the Form 1.” This means prints will be far smoother than they were in earlier versions of the software.

I’ve used the OS X version of PreForm and found it to work flawlessly on Macs. PreForm creates a lattice structure that allows you to print objects using the Form 1′s unique technology and then slices the object up for proper printing. While it’s not a formal editor, it does allow you to scale and modify some models before printing. On August 6 Form Labs released an update that allowed users to estimate print time.

via 3DPrintingIndustry

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