Professional 3D printing

The Solido SD 300 offers professional 3D printing for comparatively small amounts of money, as demonstrated in the PC magazine test lab quite impressively. The device, which was designed and built in Israel, kindly provided us with the American sales partner encee CAD / CAM-Systeme GmbH for a short test.


Affordable, professional 3D printer


The machine, which costs in the basic configuration nearly 8000 euro, works with a procedure, called Laminated Object Modeling (short LOM). The material is a plastic film from which the contours of the workpiece are cut with a knife, as with a cutting plotter.


Picture gallery


After each cutting operation, a new, 0.15 mm thick film layer is adhered and the pressure bed is lowered by the same amount. So the model is slow, layer by layer in a solid block of plastic.


The thing with the anti-skid


A strip outside the contour edges is run with a solvent-impregnated "anti-stick" before the next film layer is glued. The workpiece can then be peeled from the block. Said "anti-stick" has the device in three different strengths. The whole kinematics are similar to those of a plotter.


Function test passed


In our short test, the system left a very mature impression. Once filled with foil, glue and anti-slip, the machine makes a good start. The placement of the workpiece in the pressure space, which should be in the form of an STL file, as is generally the case, can be achieved simply by self-explanatory graphical software.


In principle, so many models can be produced in one washing up, as in the pressure chamber with its 160 x 210 x 135 mm place. The printable volume corresponds approximately to that of a shoe box.


Like all rapid prototyping and / or. 3D printing, the printing process with the Solido SD 300 also takes some time. The larger the model, the longer it takes. Larger parts can thus easily require several hours or even a whole working day. Compared to the time it takes to make complex models by conventional means, however, this is still fast-paced.


At the beginning, the machine - which in the building depth just fits on a normal desk - created a small Origami model of a pyramid consisting of only a few layers of foil. The model has to be worked very precisely, in order to be easily clipped together. The product was a convincing performance.


Our own print sample was less sophisticated, but it impressively showed that even small components - like the letters of our lettering - can be easily separated from the surrounding material.


On request, the films are also available in light blue, red, black and dark blue. The printed parts are much more robust than the structure of films suggests. The parts can also be used in functional models, not only in pure design studies.


The complexity is hardly limited. However, models with larger cavities can only be produced if the material inside can be removed through a correspondingly large opening.


Like the device, the consumables are not cheap. A kit, consisting of 175 meter foil and the corresponding amount of glue and solvent costs well 300 euros. According to the manufacturer, it is exactly enough to fill the maximum volume of the device.


For smaller workpieces, the printer draws the foil less deep into the device and also consumes layers, the Solido does not need more than for the height of the printout. However, regardless of how narrow the part is, the unit must always feed the full width of the film.


Print sample


Typically, the printer software already shows how much the print will cost. Our PC magazine lettering would have cost just 4 euros.


A more detailed picture of the Solido-3D printer is provided by a video, which the American sales have kindly made available to us. Originally, it is intended to ease the start-up of proud new owners. You can find the video on the magazine DVD.


Variations


Printing costs