Designfax weekly eMagazine

Subscribe Today!

Archives

View Archives

Partners

Manufacturing Center
Product Spotlight

Modern Applications News
Metalworking Ideas For
Today's Job Shops

Tooling and Production
Strategies for large
metalworking plants

Keepin' it really real: Stratasys redefines state-of-the-art 3D printing

Stratasys unleashed its top-of-the-line J750 multi-color, multi-material 3D printer on the world yesterday, a machine so advanced that it sets a new benchmark for the industry as a whole.

Users can choose from more than 360,000 different color polymer shades plus multiple material properties -- ranging from rigid to flexible, and opaque to transparent -- all in the same part. Just look at this sports-shoe prototype that was produced with full-color, smooth surfaces and a rubber-like sole in a single print operation.

Talk about instant gratification. Stratasys calls this "one-stop realism," and we have to agree. That's pretty real.

The PolyJet Studio software.

 

 

Top of the line in Stratasys' Objet Connex series of multi-material printers, the J750 features a streamlined workflow that starts with the all-new PolyJet Studio software. It features an intuitive user interface that allows users to simply choose materials, optimize the build, and manage print queues. Assignment of colors, transparencies, and rigidity is made easy via familiar design controls. Color textures can be loaded fully intact via VRML files imported from CAD tools. Build size is 490 x 390 x 200 mm (19.3 x 15.35 x 7.9 in.).

The J750 also minimizes downtime associated with material changeovers. Featuring a large, six-material capacity, it keeps the most-used resins loaded and ready for printing. Newly designed, state-of-the-art print heads mean that simulated production plastics, like Digital ABS, can be 3D printed in half the time of other Stratasys PolyJet systems. Because 3D-printed models are delivered complete with full colors, color textures, and multiple materials, no time is wasted on painting and assembly.

For the supply chain in general, getting such real prototypes in a couple of hours or overnight to touch and test is the fulfillment of 3D-printing wish-makers when the technology was in its infancy. On the high end, total cost of ownership never looked so good if you need to move from idea to working prototype lickety-split.

In another example, the Stratasys J750 3D Printer uses full-color 3D printing with texture mapping to create true product-matching cosmetic-tube prototypes in a single-print operation.

 

 

 

 

Early adopters like Otterbox, the phone and tablet protective-cover makers who have to work with lightning speed for every new product introduction, can testify to the new machine's abilities.

"We've used 3D printers for years, but nothing has come close to revolutionizing our design and ideation process the way the Stratasys J750 has," said Brycen Smith, engineering technician supervisor for OtterBox. "The Stratasys J750 is a game-changer for both OtterBox and the 3D-printing industry."

Designers and engineers from Synergy, a product development company in Netanya, Israel, are likewise impressed and give their take on the machine in the video above. Check out the simulated printed electronics around 1:30. Very clever.

Is the J750 for everybody? Is a Rolls Royce? Well, not unless you have deep, deep pockets.

But if you use a service bureau to do 3D-print jobs, especially, this is the wave of the future that you can expect. And if you're a small-time 3D-printer user, it's a sign of things to come for you too, because these high-end technologies may trickle down to the masses over time.

Learn more at www.stratasys.com/j750.

Easily access the specs page here: www.stratasys.com/3d-printers/production-series/stratasys-j750

Source: Stratasys

Published April 2016

Rate this article