Wematter
Etteplan Gravity 2021 Wematter
Wematter has announced a product development and prototyping collaboration with engineering company Etteplan.
As part of its design and development offering, Etteplan has been using powder bed fusion 3D printing technology which will now be replaced by Wematter’s Gravity 2021 platform, launched at Formnext Connect in November 2020. Through this partnership, Etteplan becomes one of the first companies to use the latest version of Wematter’s machine and will do so to print functional prototypes for final verification of designs.
The Gravity 2021 platform is said to be office- and user-friendly, promising reduced maintenance, improved temperature control and the ability to enable thin wall designs. It is equipped with a 300 x 300 x 300 mm build volume, a print speed 1.2cm/ hour and can currently print with PA 11 and PA 12 powders.
Etteplan is harnessing the Gravity 2021 machine in order to develop prototypes quickly, while allowing much of its staff to place a greater focus on development work instead of machine support and maintenance. The company believes this will increase the quality of its output as well as its flexibility, while the companies also intend to explore the printing of glass and carbon fibre reinforced components on the Gravity platform.
“One of the main reasons why we chose the Gravity printer from Wematter is the user friendliness of operation and how easy it is for new people to get started with the machine,” commented Matts Erikson, Head of Engineering Solutions at Etteplan Sweden.
“With our previous SLS machine, we had at least one month of training for a new operator to run the machine at a basic level. Gravity enables increased user-friendliness through optimised print parameters by default,” added Joachim Tollstoy, Area Manager at Etteplan. “The powder handling is another great advantage as we get around the challenges of handling powder in and out of the machine. Wematter has really thought about the functions that create customer value for development organisations like us.”
“I think it is very exciting that such a large and recognised player with its clear AM investment chooses us as a supplier, especially when they have experience with such an established supplier before,” offered Robert Kniola, founder and CEO of Wematter. “You also feel proud as a resident of Linköping when a multinational player such as Etteplan chooses us for its office. Etteplan is also prominent in composite manufacturing. In several projects, we have used glass and carbon fibre in our Gravity machines. We also have expertise in the field from our material scientists, which makes this collaboration very interesting.”
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