Roland monoFab series
Last year TCT visited a traditional 2D copy shop in London, who had begun to offer a 3D printing service with a HP Designjet 3D – the Stratasys U-Print. It was interesting to see this mid-range FDM machine plugging away next to wide-format inkjet printers spitting out beautiful prints at a rate of knots.
Those highly efficient wide-format printers were Roland DG machines, a market leader in wide format 2D printing. In one of the most significant entries to market this year Roland DG has just announced a desktop resin-based 3D printer, the ARM-10.
The ARM-10 is included in the new monoFab series along with a new subtractive prototyping and manufacturing machine, the SRM-20. The SRM-20 is a milling machine, a technology which Roland DG have has 25 years of experience in.
“The monoFab series desktop fabrication solutions are the culmination of over 25 years of experience in 3D milling and the company’s first foray into 3D printing,” said Akio Kawai, Roland DG general manager of 3D market development. “By combining the merits of each device, users can select the best method for their workflow every step of the way, from inspiration to production. With no limits to production methods, ideas can expand to their fullest potential and new possibilities in innovation can be realised. We hope the monoFab series tools will inspire those who wish to create the future and explore all their creative abilities.”
The ARM-10 uses the DLP 3D printing process to cure Roland's imageCure semi-transparent resin in a build area of 130 x 70 x 70mm at up to 0.01mm Z-axis resolution. The bundled software, monoFab Player AM, has a healing function to fill in any gaps in 3D data and simplification of meshes, layout editing and automatic support generation. The user-friendly interface is designed to be easy to use and ideal even for beginners.
This interesting entrance to market from a company synonymous with the 2D printing world does beg the interesting question of when the earlier mentioned HP will enter the 3D printing market.