Yesterday is still a bit of a blur, but I can say that I did meet Donnie Liverman from the Virginia-based Old World Laboratories (OWL) and saw the OWL Nano™ in real life at CES. The OWL Nano is the newest stereolithography (SL) 3D printer on the market and what it boasts over its competitors, like the FSL3D Pegasus Touch or the FormLabs Form1, is its nanoscale resolution.
As we approached the OWL booth, drawn in by the allusion to a cute animal, the first thing I noticed was the beautiful look of the machine. The OWL Nano looks like a prop designed by Stanley Kubrick for 2001: A Space Odyssey, but it’s no prop. It actually contains real sci-fact[1] technology. As with all SL machines, this one zaps a laser beam at a vat of light-curable resin. The Nano’s light source, a “single strand laser beam”, is kept “just centimeters” close to the area that it’s zapping, allowing it to capture a resolution as fine as .1 micron. Not quite a nanometer (1 micron = 1000 nanometers), but the OWL machine has a resolution 250 times finer than that of FormLabs or FSL3D. The build volume is 6” x 6” x 8” (150 x 150 x 200 mm), compared with 4.9” x 4.9” x 6.5” (125 x 125 x 165mm) from FormLabs and a 7″ x 7″x 9″ (178 x 178 x 229mm) build area from FSL3D.
Donnie Liverman, in charge of the company’s sales, told me that the cost of the machine is $4,900. o, though it may be a bit pricier than the Form1 and Pegasus Touch, you’re paying for a much finer resolution. Plus, Donnie told me that they throw in a hefty, but sturdy, carrying case at that price. Having seen the prints up close and personal, I think it might well be worth the price. The series of DNA prints, that grew smaller and smaller, were so fine that they almost inspired the meltdown in the previous Fear and Loathing post, but it was starting to exceed six pages, so I had to cut it.
At CES, we saw four different desktop SL machines, none of which were from 3D Systems. After the lawsuit that took place between FormLabs/Kickstarter and 3DS, which FormLabs would not comment on, and the settlement that proceeded, I wonder if it’s become clear that other businesses are okay to go ahead and make their own stereolithography printers. If so, I feel like it’s evidence of the potential harmful impact that patents can have on the marketplace and development of new technologies. Without healthy competition, we might not have a company like OWL pushing the limits of print resolution in desktop SL machines.
[1] A word I just made up to represent the actualization of sci-fi concepts in this increasingly futuristic world. Ok, so I probably didn’t make it up. I’m sure someone else came up with it light years before me.
I am a bit confused on the reported resolution of 0.1 micron??
To get such resolution using laser diodes that are in the range of 375-405 nm one would have to use a confocal method. In going with such optical configuration the laser would have to be with in a 100 nm to keep that resolution.
Thanks, Steve! Let me check with the manufacturers and get back to you!
Sorry to take so long to respond! After sending him your exact comment, Donny got back to me and let me know that they’re wary of releasing the specific specs that allow them to achieve such high resolution. What he did tell me is that the company will be having their printers tested by a few organizations that will be able to verify the claim.
I’m also wary of the claims.
Judging from the DNA photo, and knowing that the diameter of the Washington quarter is 24.3mm, the largest figure is 31.4mm high, the horizontal bars are ~1mm. The smallest figure, which seems to be missing a bar (probably of the limit of the resolution) is ~ 6.5 mm high, assuming that it’s the same shape, the horizontal bar has to be ~200 microns, still 2000 times above the supposed resolution of the device, yet it missed a bar.
There is always the possibility that it broke during manipulation of course…
<3 sci-fact
Well i requested test prints when they announced the printer and they have avoided doing them ever since… im left wondering if this is a bit of a scam.
I think the 0.1 micron claim is also BS and pure hype. Silicon micromechanical (MEMS) devices do not have access to this level of accuracy, and they rely on decades worth of semiconductor photolithography. It’s also questionable if any resin can hold that tolerance over any typical operating temperature range.
It isn’t what it seems. The price is way higher, and the company a bit… evasive. I just need parts printed for now. So not much has changed in the past year.
Lance Cobb Sep 15 (1 day ago)
to me
Harvey,
We only manufacture our printers for sell. Our MC-1 is 1 micron resolution at $150,000 and the MC-2 is 100 nanometers at $250,000. If you are asking if our machines can hit your project resolutions as a set of wireframe cubes, yes it can but we don’t sell component parts just the machines we manufacture.
Respectfully,
Lance Cobb
Executive VP of Sales
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 757-355-0032
Website: http://www.oldworldlabs.com
Lance,
Respectfully — the community finds it suspicious that you guys are not showing prints of the 0.1 um (or even 1 um) resolutions on your website. You would get so much free publicity and excitement!
Best,
Albert Folch
University of Washington
Bioengineering Dept.
http://faculty.washington.edu/afolch/
http://twitter.com/FolchLab/