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3D printing: What happened in 2018?
Posted By Lucie Gaget on Dec 24, 2018 | 0 comments
A lot of amazing things can happen in just one year. For 3D printing, 2018 has been a really great year, for the whole 3D printing world, but also for Sculpteo. Let’s take a look at this amazing year and more precisely, at all the amazing projects created around the world thanks to 3D printing technology. Then we will see how 2018 has been a great year for Sculpteo with a lot of new projects and great partnerships.
What happened in 2018 in the 3D printing world?
The first family to move into a 3D printed house
In 2018 we had the proof that 3D printing is an amazing asset for architecture. 3D printed houses are becoming a reality thanks to XL 3D printing and concrete 3D printers, but it is now possible to print real houses where families can live. This year, in France, a family move in a 3D printed house!
3D printed houses are a real revolution and could be the solution to the housing crisis.
3D printed car parts & the 3D printed motorcycle
We can notice a growing interest of the automotive industry for additive manufacturing. Indeed, 3D printing technology is particularly helpful to work on a new design, to create custom-made car parts, or prototypes!
In 2018, Bugatti, the French automotive manufacturer, actually included some 3D printed car parts in its new car, the Divo Supercar!
We recently saw the amazing project of the 3D printed motorcycle developed by BigRep, showing that it is now possible to 3D print a whole vehicle! The design is pretty impressive, additive manufacturing was really the best manufacturing technique to make this futuristic project. All the parts of this prototype have been 3D printed using the FFF (Fused Filament Fabrication) technology, except of course for the electronic parts. It means that the seat, frame, tires, rims, and the fork, that are actually connecting the front wheel and axle to the frame, are all 3D printed!
3D printed eye
Experimentations with additive manufacturing are always going further, we saw in 2018 that it might even be possible to 3D print an eye soon. Indeed, researchers from Italy created a futuristic bionic eye prototype using 3D printing. It is a significant step for the medical industry: researchers have successfully 3D printed light receptors onto a circular surface, which resulted in the first-ever 3D printed prototype of a bionic eye.
Check out this video for more details about this experiment:
3D printed inflatable structure
with the evolution of the 3D printing technology and of 3D printing material, it is now possible to 3D print inflatable structures.
Here is another innovation created for the automotive industry, to manufacture futuristic cars. This year, we saw the result of a collaboration of the Self-Assembly Lab from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and the car manufacturer BMW. A new 3D printing process, the Rapid Liquid Printing technique, allowed them to create new incredible shape-changing structures. More than 3D printing, these inflatable structures are really close to 4D printing.
3D printed kidney
Medical 3D printing also went further this year: some 3D printed kidney transplants have been quite successful in the news. These 3D printed organs are really showing that additive manufacturing has quite a bright future in the medical industry, and this technology has a great ability to save lives.
Bioprinting and the development of new 3D printing materials are starting to offer new amazing possibilities.
What happened at Sculpteo?
Valoptim & Sculpteo: 3D printing architectural models
3D printing allows for developing projects that are highly customizable and that is precisely what Valoptim decided to do. The property development company, Valoptim, decided to create models of their flats for their customers, using our online 3D printing service!
Indeed, Valoptim decided to offer 3D mock-ups to their customers when buying a new flat. This way, future owners get an accurate model of their home, in order to materialize the new flat they purchased. In this case, 3D printing becomes a solution to improve the customers’ relationship!
ISO 9001 – 2015 standard and partnership with Bombardier
At Sculpteo we recently obtained the ISO 9001 – 2015 standard: this standard confirms the high quality of the process and services we are offering. It also enables our company to partner with the largest industrial companies, such as Bombardier!
You certainly know Bombardier, one of the world’s leading manufacturer for both planes and trains. They chose Sculpteo to manufacture some of their parts, such as comparators, pulleys and targets, but also for acoustics like acoustical racquets, microphone mount, etc.
What will this standard change for you? Check our last blog post for more information about this standard and our partnership with Bombardier!
Sculpteo became the biggest HP production center in France
In 2018, Sculpteo became the biggest HP production center in France!! We want to offer the best to our clients: the best technologies, the best materials, the best 3D printing service. That is why we are offering to our customers the possibility to print their parts with the HP Multi Jet Fusion technology. This 3D printing technology allows the creation of functional prototypes, but it is also an efficient technology for production, to get parts with a great finish aspect.
State of 3D printing 2018
It is a little bit of a tradition, this year we launched our 2018 edition of the State of 3D printing. Each year this study allows us to see what are the main trends in the 3D printing world: a growing us of the 3D printing technology is some sectors such as aeronautics, growing use of metal 3D printing, etc. We can see how and why companies are using this cutting-edge technology and what are the real benefits of this manufacturing technique!
What were your favorite 3D printing projects this year? What are your expecting for 2019? Share with us in the comments!
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