Blackbelt 3D - What we know

- a quick glance at twitter reveals an exciting new 3D printer

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In the midst of the numerous football, comedy, current affairs and 3D printing tweets that clog up my timeline (@docefc in case you're interested) it's easy to miss the genuinely interesting stuff. 

But last week a retweet from the Dutch materials manufacturer Colorfabb (@colorfabb) really grabbed my attention. The RT showed an enormous (in 3D printed terms) automotive part on what looks like a treadmill by an account called Blackbelt 3D Printer. 

The size, quality and the fact it was printed with filament immediately got the spidey senses tingling. I began scrolling through Blackbelt's other tweets to see incredible part after incredible part all printed using Colorfabb's materials and, perhaps most intriguingly, printing overhangs without supports. 

Blackbelt are, like true karate masters, remaining tight-lipped about the printer until its launch on June 1st but here is what information we do know from that amazing resource that is the internet: 

The CEO and (what appears to be) inventor of Blackbelt 3D is Stephan Schürmann, who is a name you may recognise if you follow 3D printing blogs. Stephan previously worked at Colorfabb (hence the retweets) and, during his time there, ran a 3D printed bike project, that drummed up a fair few column inches.

I'm guessing that during the bike project, in which Stephan used Colorfabb's XT-CF20 material on two other Dutch 3D printers - an Ultimaker and Stacker - the CEO had a lightbulb moment and went from 3D printer user to inventor (watch out for this theme of transition at RAPID + TCT).

The Blackbelt 3D printer appears to be an FDM printer that prints directly onto a conveyor belt, which I'm guessing has some sort of adhesive. The conveyor belt means it is able to print huge parts like the RC Plane wing or that five-metre long timing belt (printed in a flexible material) below. 

This printing process is not unlike the Stratasys Infinite Build, which in essence simply flipped 3D printing on its side to build bigger parts. It is also clear the machine is able to be production ready, parts must be able to be queued and the conveyor belt runs parts directly into a bin at the end. It looks as if Blackbelt3D have been in touch with Josef Prusa with regards to printing parts for the Prusa i3.

One thing I am intrigued to find out, and we will bring you more at the launch on June 1st, is how it is able to print parts without supports. From the photos it looks like a nozzle that is printing onto a moving platform, perhaps the nozzle has more axes than the traditional x, y and z? 

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Whatever it is the parts look great and we're sure Blackbelt 3D is a company to watch out for.

UPDATE 03/05/2017 09.30

The Reddit 3D Printing Community is always a fantastic resource for any technology speculation and members have a theory about how Blackbelt is printing those overhangs. It has been spotted that the print carriage is tilted towards the camera meaning it is printing at an angle. As noted this can be seen in the way the layers run at nearly a 45-degree angle.