What’s 3D printing?
3D printing has become more prevalent in the past couple of years due to lower costs and product innovation. 3D printers take a digital 3D model of a mechanical part and turn it into a physical object by depositing material layer by layer, which is why 3D printing is also called additive manufacturing (in comparison to subtractive manufacturing, where material would have to be removed to form the part).
You may have seen a 3D printer in your local school, library, makerspace, or maybe you own one yourself! Those 3D printers are likely using fused deposition modeling (FDM), stereolithography (SLA), or digital light processing (DLP). Melted plastic filament is extruded in FDM printers, and a light-sensitive resin is cured using a laser in SLA printers or a digital light projector screen in DLP printers.
But there’s one 3D printer that you probably haven’t seen or probably don’t own: a selective laser sintering (SLS) printer. An SLS printer uses a laser beam to sinter, or fuse, a layer of polymer powder into a solid structure. The benefits of SLS over FDM, SLA, and DLP are more mechanically durable parts, no need for support structures (which must be removed from FDM and SLA parts), and the ability to print moving or interlocking parts. While SLS technology isn’t new, the technology hasn’t been very accessible due to its complexity and high price, but more companies are starting to release lower-cost, more compact models, so you might see one around your neighbourhood soon!
