EnvisionTEC to unveil 'ground-breaking' enhancement to Perfactory 4 3D printer line and 7 new materials

The P4 line will bring higher accuracy with a new custom LED system, while the seven materials will serve industrial and medical applications.

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Professional-grade 3D printer supplier, EnvisionTEC is to unveil a significant performance enhancement to the fourth generation of its flagship Perfactory 3D printer line, along with seven new materials, at next week’s RAPID+TCT show.

The Perfactory 3D printer series launched the company 15 years ago and has since been built on three times, with the Perfactory 2, Perfactory 3 and Perfactory 4 (P4). From Booth #1813 at the David L. Lawrence Convention Center in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, EnvisionTEC will showcase the ‘ground-breaking’ LED light system which will be offered across the P4 line of 3D printers.

In development for more than a year, EnvisionTEC believe the new LED light system to be more powerful and efficient than other projector light systems currently on the market. This allows crisper black-white contrast between pixels, which means better final part detail, and also contributes to lowering the operating costs.

“EnvisionTEC’s new LED system is an example of how we listen to our customers and have worked with them for 15 years to develop better 3D printing solutions,” said CEO Al Siblani. “Our new LED system will offer production 3D printer users much lower operating costs. As an added benefit, the exceptional detail that our machines already produce will get even better because of the improved range of brightness from the LEDs.”

Since the company announced itself as a 3D printing player 15 years ago, EnvisionTEC has prided itself on its ability to offer the highest accuracy and best resolution in the vat photopolymerisation market. Now the P4 line, made up of nine machines of varying sizes, reinforces this attainment.

The P4 LED Standard XL offers a build envelope of 192 x 180 x 230mm with XY accuracy of 100 µm. Meanwhile, the P4 LED Mini offers XY resolution as low as 10 µm with an adjustable Z resolution ranging from 15 to 150 µm. Additionally, the new LED system means the P4 line also comes with the most powerful and cost-efficient light source.

The average cost per hour of the P4’s outgoing ultra-high-performance (UHP) lamp, which uses high-pressure mercury gas to emit light, was $2.90, with an estimated life of 500 hours. Its replacement LED system costs just $0.50 per hour and can last an estimated 10,000 hours.

Alongside the P4 line’s new LED system, EnvisionTEC will also launch its first ever line of medical-grade materials for its 3D-Bioplotter Series of printers, as well as three new engineering-grade materials for industrial users.

The new releases take EnvisionTEC’s materials repertoire to above the 170 mark, with a broad range of functionalities and colours.

“These new offerings showcase our commitment to material development as well as our close relationships with customers, who have asked us to develop specific materials for our highly accurate and reliable machines,” said Siblani.

The three new industrial materials are now available for users of EnvisionTEC’s Desktop, Perfactory and 3SP printers.

E-CE, a stiff, heat-resistant material that also offers chemical resistance is comparable to other cyan-type ester materials in the 3D printing market. EnvisionTEC suggests E-CE is suitable for industrial applications that require thermal stability, such as electronic encasements. E-Poxy, ideal for connectors due to its flexibility, hardness and heat-resistance, is a partially biosourced, dual-core material. The third material, the E-Model Flex, is a highly accurate modelling material with improved elongation at break that will be offered in both green and black.

EnvisionTEC’s first ever line of material for the 3D-Bioplotter includes Silicone TG, a technical grade silicone for building soft implant surgical models; PCL 45K RG, a Research Grade (RG) polycarbonate (PCA) for tissue engineering applications; LT Support RG, a low-temperature research grade saccharide material derived from cellulose used for sacrificial supports; and HT Support RG, a high-temperature sugar derivative material that is also used as a sacrificial support material.

EnvisionTEC will be presenting all new releases from Booth #1813 for the duration of RAPID+TCT 2017.