New polished and colored Alumide available

Posted By Arthur Cassaignau on Nov 4, 2015 | 0 comments

20 days after our latest material announcement on plastic, we’re making our Alumide material evolve too. Starting today, polished and colored Alumide are available too.

First question: What is Alumide?  Alumide is a 3D printed material composed of polyamide and aluminium. That way it keeps most of the polyamide properties but adds the metallic feel of aluminium. Alumide can be used for both the production of ready to use parts (prototype, tool inserts for injecting and moulding, small batch of production) but also for visuals mock-ups. After some testing, we’re finally launching two new finishes for our Alumide material. It’s now available in four colors (blue, red, green and black) with a raw or polished finish.

Skulls printed in polished and colored Alumide

How can you access those new finishes? First in our material page, if you want more info about Alumide itself and see how the different finish combinations look like.

Same with brains !

Second, directly in the printing settings. It works similarly as for other materials. You first need to choose the material, and then you’ll be able to select a color and the polishing option. Note that if you just select Alumide, it will simply use the default settings: raw and metallic grey Alumide.

The main difference between the raw and polished finish is the shiny surface left by the polishing process. As for the regular plastic material, polishing means a smoother surface, but it the case of Alumide it also makes the aluminium present in the material pop. You can see the difference between the two below:

The leftskull of each color is the one polished, the right one is raw.

In the background, the part are made of raw and colored Alumide. In the foreground, they’re polishing and colored.

About the dimensions. They’re also fairly similar as the ones of our plastic material since we’re following the same process for the two materials.

• Polished: 19 x 24 x 31.5cm
• Colored (by dyeing): 18 x 22 x 22 cm
• Polished and colored: 18 x 22 x 22 cm

The maximum size for a raw and uncolored Alumide part remains 30 x 30 x 50 cm.

A short word about the lead-time. Depending on when you pass the order, we’ll be able to deliver this new polishing finish in 4 to 8 days. Coloring the part will add one day.