Stratasys’ Objet brand has always kept a step ahead in terms of the broad range of materials — including digital materials — that it offers. For a long time, the company has been a supplier of flexible and rigid materials, and more recently brought a broad spectrum of multi-colour material capabilities to the market.
Now, though, Stratasys is bringing the two together and launching flexible colour materials as it extends its 3D printing material options even further. The materials are specially developed for the Objet500 Connex3 Color Multi-material 3D Printer.
According to the company, hundreds of new rubber-like colour materials, as well as many rigid ones, can be combined with existing digital material options to produce a virtually unlimited combinations of flexible, rigid, and translucent-to-opaque colours in a single print run.
For producing prototypes with true-to-life aesthetics this is a further step forward for users of the Connex3 3D printer and allows for the production of complete products without manual assembly or painting.
The new range of materials are on show at the RAPID 2014 event taking place in Detroit this week. If you can’t make it to Detroit this week, however, you can see some of the 3D printed parts made from these materials in the video below:
Of the new material additions to the product range, Stratasys Director of Materials & Applications, Fred Fischer commented: “The Objet500 Connex3 is the only 3D printer that combines colors with multi-material 3D printing. The ability to mix rigid, flexible, transparent and opaque colors offers users unprecedented versatility to design and perfect products faster. By extending the range of material options available, users can improve workflow speeds and enhance efficiency.”
In terms of the specs for the new materials, they range from transparent to opaque and span a wide selection of Shore A values, and comprise six rubber material palettes:
- Three flexible 72-color palettes, composed of rubber-like (TangoPlus) and combinations of rigid opaque (VeroCyan, VeroMagenta and VeroYellow) materials.
- Three flexible 68-color palettes, built with rubber-like (TangoBlackPlus) and combinations of the same rigid opaque (Vero) colours.
Further strengthening its rigid colour range, Stratasys also increased the number of gray and subtle colour options with three 45-colour rigid gray palettes, each of which combines rigid VeroWhite and VeroBlack with colours; as well as one 45-hue gray palette, with varying levels of translucency, and which includes a reflective luster for the production of sleek, high-quality parts for products such as consumer electronics.
The new flexible color options are available immediately to Objet500 Connex3 Color Multi-material 3D Printer owners through a free software update.
