Realize would like to wish everyone a happy Valentine’s Day! To help celebrate the occasion we created some beautiful 3D Printed Roses just for you. The molds were 3D printed and the parts you see in the pics are urethane over-molded with urethane.
There’s a common misconception that SL materials lose their physical properties and become brittle and break over time. That may have been true for the first generations of materials, but not for the new generation of SL resins from Somos®. Somos® R&D invests considerable time and money to develop the best SL materials available today.
| Somos® Stands the Test of Time |
| Somos® is paving the way in Stereolithography (SL) for end-use applications. Until recently, long term stability of SL materials was relatively unknown. At Somos®, we have begun testing selected products and monitoring property change over time.
“Understanding and being able to predict the aging characteristics of various materials opens the door for moving into real end-use applications,” says Kevin Zaras, Application Development Manager.
We just passed the one year mark for testing on Somos® NeXt and Somos® WaterShed XC 11122. The great news is that we saw no major changes in physical properties, which compared as well as competing technologies such as FDM and LS. We will continue adding to this data with other products and other test conditions such as UV and Environmental aging. |
Characterizing the long term stability of these materials is becoming critical in qualifying them for production environments. Somos® NeXt Aging Data Materials that can go the distance The results of Somos® NeXt are in Somos® compared general physical properties of Somos® NeXt with a LS PA and a FDM ABS over the course of one year. Even after one year, Somos® NeXt was comparable to FDM and LS with little overall change in tensile properties. Now, engineers considering 3D printing their production parts can think outside the box and use Somos® NeXt and stereolithography’s fine feature detail, high accuracy and smooth surface quality for their applications. Perfect for noncritical components like harnesses, spacers, jigs and fixtures, Somos® NeXt takes SL to the next level.
Maybe it’s not cool, or sanitary when restaurants marry their ketchup bottles, but when it comes to resin we make every drop count! More resin for all the wonderful prototypes we have coming through our building.
A bad board makes it difficult to tune the mirrors. #SLAproblems
Sometimes the things we do can expand out in ways never imagined. In this case, a video about a project we worked on lead us to a brave young man that is fighting a difficult battle everyday.
After posting the videos and stories about our Star Wars BB8 3D Printing project, our President(Todd Reese) was contacted with a special request. Our video about the creation of the prototype was shared with a courageous young man named Gavin and he was thrilled that we worked on the BB8 project, as he is a huge Star Wars fan. Sadly, he has been very ill recently and didn’t get to see the new movie. In some small way watching our video helped perk him up a bit. He has a disease called Mitochondrial Disease which is now causing him to have a variety of side effects and other illnesses. The request was; if they were to send us a mini BB8 robot, would the Realize team sign it for him. Of course we were thrilled that, in some small way, we could make Gavin smile and made a plan to do as much as we could.
Gavin watching the Realize BB8 video.
We decided to 3D Print him an X-wing fighter, light saber & included some other goodies too.
The goods
Another local business owner found out about this story and was kind enough to contact us and include some of her products customized just for Gavin. The owner of Sweet Home Cupcakes, Nazarine Terstegge, donated BB8 cake pops and decorated some pretzel logs to look like light sabers for him. Thanks for your kindness!
Nazerine from Sweet Home Cupcakes.
The best part.
Here is a description about the disease from Gavin’s grandmother.
“When Gavin was diagnosed, it was rare. The more research they do on it, the more they connect it with other auto immune, and genetic diseases. Gavin’s started with tremors that affected his whole body. He has several kinds of seizures, sometimes several a day. It has affected his brain and his speech. His thought process is very slow. One of the main things that has affected Gavin, is he has no energy. He is in a wheelchair. The chair isn’t needed in the house. He has been in Hospice care for 2 years. Something as simple as the flu can kill him. He’s a fighter, and is a very brave little guy.”
To learn more about this disease and how you can help:
Gavin’s Facebook page & More information on the disease
We wish Gavin many more days filled with smiles and joy. May the force be with you Gavin.
BB8 for Gavin
3D Printing/Rapid Prototyping & Manufacturing