The “capability boundary” of 3D printers has been greatly expanded – in the classic report of “The Third Industrial Revolution” in The Economist in 2012, the 3D printed works that shocked the authors are nothing more than Hammer; but for the next three years, the achievements of 3D printing in racing cars, housing, and drones are dazzling and have replaced the traditional factory.

However, yesterday, Shanghai, at the 3D printing summit forum hosted by Stratasys, the world's largest 3D printing company, the innovators at the forefront of the industry believe that it is not representative to grab the factory's rice bowl and change the way to manufacture existing products. The trend of 3D printing, its true future belongs to those things that “do not exist now”, whether it is products or rules.

Make a fuss about something special

When many people competed to use 3D printers to challenge the limits of large-volume works, Wen Li, an associate professor at Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, did the opposite and made a fuss about “small places” – on a flexible material, Wenli’s team Printed a "artificial shark skin".

Under the microscope, the shark skin, which has been magnified hundreds of times, looks like a tiled roof, and this microstructure can greatly reduce the resistance to swimming. Wen Li said that the shingle on the surface of the shark skin is very hard and small, only 120 microns long and wide, attached to the soft flesh. To copy, the process must be precise enough and at least be able to handle both soft and hard materials. This is something that any machine tool can't do.

But for 3D printers, this is not a problem. Today, mainstream technology can print at least eight different soft, hard, color or transparency materials, while the detailed texture on the surface is the 3D printing feature. Wenli printed shark skin, the largest has been able to reduce water resistance by 34%. This new feature not only creates super-suits or ultra-fast submarines, but also greatly enhances the “self-cleaning ability” of materials. Yesterday, a video displayed by Wenli showed that on a piece of mobile phone screen with a lot of dust and shark skin, just drop a drop of water and shake it, then wash away all the dirty things.

In fact, yesterday's meeting also showed some other "miracle" of 3D printer manufacturing. For example, many people think that 3D printing is impossible to make a mobile phone. Indeed, this law has not expired, but it is loose. One participant showed his work, the transmitter, which, although not as complex as a mobile phone, was still an electronic information terminal and successfully telegraphed the telegram.

Of course, the transmitter does not belong to “Now does not exist”, but follow the same line of thinking, let people see the potential of 3D printing in the production of “active equipment”. Unlike hammers, pipes, and molds, “active devices” can still work without human active control – the most advanced is the robot. According to reports, Google, which is currently at the top of the global robot development, was reported last week to try to use a 3D printer to implant a hydraulic device into a mechanical leg in a blood vessel-like manner. Compared to the "screw + motor" structure, this "skin and flesh" robot will significantly improve the efficiency of the sport.

Wenli is also currently studying a robot that is different from the previous form. This time, his bionic object has been changed from shark to octopus. In the video he showed, a "five fingers" is like a silicone-like robot, lightly grabbing a variety of "fragile items" from CDs, tomatoes to live crabs. Wen Li said that the flexible manipulator completely frees the robot from bluntness and coldness, and the price is only 1/100 of that of a traditional robot.

Reshaping the manufacturing industry

If 3D printing will lead people to those areas that have not yet appeared, then in addition to these technical achievements, production methods and game rules will also undergo major changes.

According to Howard Lipson, a professor at Cornell University in the United States, the advantages of 3D printing go far beyond what people usually know: no mold opening, rapid prototyping, and WYSIWYG. He said that 3D printing is truly disruptive to the entire manufacturing process, format and supply chain.

Lipson is the world's first author of the book on 3D printing revolution. Yesterday at the venue, he told the audience that in essence, 3D printing broke the ten basic laws in the traditional manufacturing process. For example, in general, the more complicated items, the higher the cost of manufacturing, but 3D printing has eliminated this. "The cost of complexity." Similarly, it eliminates the cost of diversity, making the cost of producing 100 different items at the same time consistent with the cost of producing a single product; eliminating the assembly process because it can be printed at one time; leaving workers no longer needed training because operating the machine will not Special Skills……

In response to this view, Omar Clegg, General Manager of Stratasys Asia Pacific, also said that the biggest challenge for 3D printing is not to develop new printing materials and devices, but to guide users – mainly manufacturing plants, so that they can The challenge of meeting the new production model culturally: “Only those companies that are most active in embracing innovation and change are likely to adapt to change.”

He used a recent case to describe who is "a company that actively embraces 3D printing revolution." Interestingly, in this case, the 3D printer did not make any complicated items, only a fan blade was printed. This is a company owned by Haier. The fan blades of the imported equipment are broken, and the replacement parts take 3 months. The engineers who were forced to go to Liangshan took inspiration and used the 3D printer to turn the fan back in 2 days, and it was until three months later that the official parts arrived.

"This is something that nobody has ever done, and it takes about 3 seconds to think of this idea, but this is the most challenging 3 seconds," Omar said.

(Editor)

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