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Flotspotting: XEOS 3D Printer Concept by Stefan Reichert

By Ray Hu - October 5, 2012

in Flotspotting | Digital Fabrication

Last time we heard from Stefan Reichert, he'd just completed a year at the University of Cincinnati's DAAP, where he worked on the "E-Motion" electric-assist bicycle. Ever ahead of the curve, he's pleased to present his thesis project for his Bachelor of Arts in Industrial Design at the University of Wuppertal, "the first desktop 3D-printer that actually fits on your desk and in your office." The XEOS 3D is a fitting Flotspotting feature to end this week of 3D printer news (besides the printers themselves, let's not forget the two vastly different yet equally brilliant 3D printed objects we've seen this week: Teague Labs' 13:30 headphones and Ben Chapman's knife sharpener).Desktop 3D printing is becoming more and more important. With a breakthrough new printing arm XEOS 3D changes the design and size of a desktop 3D printer radically and creates an new archetype. The clean interior and transparent two window design, a 66% smaller enclosure volume compared to the smallest professional FDM 3D printer available and the thoroughgoing easy and intuitive controls—in its software and at the device—elevate XEOS 3D to a whole new category of 3D printers.

Unlike the vast majority of desktop 3D printers currently on the market, the print arm of the XEOS 3D has a single point of attachment, along the (correct me if I'm mistaken) x- and z-axes. The hinge allows for movement along the x/y axis.

Additional features, verbatim from this slide: - The uplifting door gives easy access to the printed parts and the cartridge bays - The integrated fisheye camera helps to control the printing process from everywhere - Over 80% of design firm print jobs fit into the 5”times;5”×5” build envelope - Two material cartridge bays hold the ABS filament and water-resolvable support

- The LED status bar displays the printjob progress and is easy to see even across the room - At 19” wide, 17.5” high and 11” deep, its volume is 66% (100 L / 26.5 gal) smaller than the smallest FDM 3D printer with the same build envelope (Stratsys Mojo) - The Stop/Open button is the only hardware button on the outside to stop and open the door

Hit the jump to see it in action:

It seems that Reichert fully intends to bring the XEOS 3D to market, as he has built both a prototype and a website with further details.

Naturally, we expect a bit of feedback regarding Reichert's design. Any of you digital fabricators notice any obvious or less obvious issues with the 3D printer concept?

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tim

12 years ago

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The mechanical workings of this type of project is more a problem for an engineer rather than a designer. Or at least a designer who has very good mechanical aptitude.

Although, ill admit, it looks quite nice, Stefan probably shouldn't have messed with the gantry style setup you see in almost all CNC equipment, just for the sake of... i don't even know what. Good luck finding the budget to reinvent the CAM software from scratch.

The inertia of the arm (mentioned earlier) is definitely a big problem. You probably cant use $15 stepper motors anymore, you need some kind of heavy, expensive, high torque, impossibly precise geared motor (if the arm was extended to 5" the base motor on the arm would need to consistently be able turn an absurdly small 0.02 degrees to move the arm 0.002"). That wouldn't be great for overall cost, print speeds, and acceleration of the print arm.

The recent explosion in 3d printers is due to the fact that they are now AFFORDABLE. You dont try to hop on to that bandwagon by introducing a FDM printer with a 5x5x5 build envelope that is probably going to be just as expensive as a much more capable entry level SLS machine.
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James Patrick

12 years ago

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From a design point of view(strictly aesthetics), I think he did a great job, very high-quality renderings. As for the engineering side, there could be some issues. First, there is no "prototype" featured anywhere on the website. There's a fullscale model, but that's about as useful as a wooden apple. I think the designer knows enough about 3D printing to realize the need for a soluble support material, but not enough to include a heated build platform. Second, the print cartridges are extremely small for an ABS/PLA plastic printer. Cartridges of that size probably wouldn't hold enough filament to print the object in the demo. Third, the arm. I don't see any issue with the printing arm in terms of sagging, as long as high precision bearings are used. This would be a fragile part of the machine though, so any downward pressure would likely ruin the arm. I assume the silver-colored pieces would be made of plastic so weight would not be a major issue. Robotic arms have been successfully used for 3D printing in the past. I feel as though a printer of this much design consideration should be using a resin/light-based printing system. Plastic filament printing is finicky and required a lot of user intervention.
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chris

12 years ago

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Fun to experiment and see if we daisy chain these with robot assembly machines if we can develop a self sustaining / self replicating robot world......I bet with some time, money and effort we could get a little robot to extract material, process and deliver it....these things manufacture based on need and a library of designs.....robot assembly and distribution. Totally fun and possible experiment...basically like replicating "life". Example, if raw materials were slow to come, the machines would realize it and assemble more material extractors, processors and deliverers...if the system needed improving it would have to produce "designer" machines that could access where improvements were needed, "design" the specs and send them to the 3D printers....code in feedback loops so all the machines talk to each other......facinating possibilities.
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zachh

12 years ago

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"Capturing the fascination of blah blah" surprise: clients don't care if you're fascinated while it's printing. They want the object printed."

This statement is true if you're framing it within a commercial context, however, the long term vision is to bring products like this into a residential or non-commercial context. If people purchase durable goods purely on function, then we'd have a bunch of 'machines' housed in opaque boxes - not the case (turntables, lab/scientific auto-pickers, watch casings, engine bonnets, etc.)

... And for student design work, he's killing it. Only a jaded mechanical engineer would disagree. I would suggest he tones down his marketing rhetoric though.

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Noah Vawter

12 years ago

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comments?

yeah, what Androo said about the articulated arm. It's great for printing shapes of that concavity and set of radii, but what about straight lines? And furthermore, at full extension, that arm is likely to droop. It would not be as bad/heavy if he took off all of that custom aluminum covering everything.

and what about the fact there are no sample printed objects anywhere!? hello? does this thing even exist?!

A 3-d printer is judged on: the quality of the objects, the print time, the cost of ownership. I don't give a flippity-flip about the delorean style doors. Put the money and resources into making a quality machine.

And I don't care for the advertising copy "Redefining 3d desktop printing..." is 3D desktop printing actually even defined for the first time yet? If so, how different is this from others? Is *this one* defined at all?

"Capturing the fascination of blah blah" surprise: clients don't care if you're fascinated while it's printing. They want the object printed.

You gotta have functionality before you have style!

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Androo

12 years ago

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I would say that the advertising is patently false. The PP3DP Up! Mini has a heated build area, smart support material, a comparable build area (4.7" x 4.7" x 4.7"), and the printer itself is fully half the overall size. Granted, it doesn't have the secondary extruder nozzle, though it does have very smart support-material algorithms that make removal of the supports very easy.

I also have serious concerns about the actuation of that articulated arm over typical gantry-style layouts. Not only is it more complex, but inertia is the enemy of extreme accuracy when it comes to 3D printing, and there's a lot more mass being swung around than with the standard extruder block that's on a single-axis slide.

Looks cool, but it really does seem like change for the sake of style more than anything else.
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