Mesoscale manufacturing technologies
Established and widely accessible
Resin 3D printing. Allows for rather small high detail parts compared to
FFF/FDM molten plastic extrusion printing.
Either used directly or for mold making.
Experimental - How to make very many small precise decently hard metal parts for extremely cheap?
Galvanic electroforming/electrotyping:
First crude experiment. FDM printed plastic was not tight enough.
https://x.com/AlaskaLawlor/status/1535681835102965760 (by Orion Lawlor)
UV resin printed plastic instead might work.
CG model of a mold:
https://x.com/AlaskaLawlor/status/1534375298036142080
The risk of too fast growth is worst case dendridic growth with porosity
or still bad large single crystals brittle as the grain boundaries.
Thus relevance of the following:
Dense galvanic deposition of significant layer thicknesses (by Shaun Mulligan):
https://x.com/ProjectQuine/status/1554060533195833345
https://x.com/ProjectQuine
Could this work or would?
UV resin for small scale positive =>
metakaolin for heat tolerant geo-polymer negative =>
aluminum (or brass) powder for positive (in case of aluminum N2 or Ar atmosphere while melting the powder)
Potential issues: Geopolymer mold deforming at temperature, aurface wetting and tension issues like
aluminum fusing with silicatic geopolymer moldor (less likely) aluminum not filling the edger
(Idea here: Unlike calcium based cement geopolymer can be water free and thus serve as mold for higher temperatures without cracking.)
Companies
Microfabrica:
Some sort of galvanic electrofoming process for meso to microscale metal parts:
https://microfabrica.com/
https://twitter.com/microfabrica3D
Micromac – laser micromachining
https://3d-micromac.com/
Micro lasercutting machines (as used for the GIK (great invention kit) of MIT center of bits and atoms)
Mentined in the videos linked here: The three axes of the Center for Bits and Atoms
External links
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroforming
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electrotyping
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroplating