Here at 3D Rapid Print, one of the fastest growing 3D Printing companies in the Thames Valley, we like to keep abreast of the latest innovations in 3D printing.
On August 2nd 2022, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) announced that a group of its researchers had streamlined establishing the best parameters to get a new material to consistently 3D print properly via artificial intelligence, developing a system that could correct errors in how the material was handled in real-time. (Here, an error refers to either too much or too little material being deposited in specific areas of the object being printed.) MIT argued that determining the ideal parameters of a digital manufacturing process can be one of its most expensive parts, due to needing so much trial-and-error. MIT also contended that once someone finds a combination of parameters that works well, they are only ideal for one specific situation, as they give hardly any data on how the material would behave in different environments or on different hardware.
To measure what happens on a 3D printer in real-time, the team developed a system that uses 2 cameras aimed at the printer’s nozzle, which shine light at the material as it’s deposited to measure its thickness. Next, the controller would use the images it received to adjust the printer’s direction and feed rate based on any errors it saw. To train their controller, the team tasked it with selecting printing parameters that would create a certain object in a simulated environment. After being shown the expected output, the model was rewarded when the parameters it chose minimised the error between its print and the expected outcome. As the model did more simulated prints, it updated its control policy to maximise the reward and became more accurate.
MIT boasted that its system 3D printed objects more accurately than all the other 3D printing controllers it was compared to and could even adjust parameters in response to how the material spread after being deposited. For further work, the team hopes to develop controllers for other manufacturing processes, as well as experiment with how their method could be modified for where there are multiple layers of material, or multiple materials being 3D printed simultaneously.
3D printing is an amazing tool. It can grow your small business or start a mini revolution in an industry. Explore what it can do for you when you contact us today.
Disclaimer: Featured image of “Classic shot of the ENIAC (full resolution)” is a work of a U.S. Army soldier or employee, taken or made as part of that person’s official duties. As a work of the U.S. federal government, it is in the public domain in the United States.
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