Born for Prototyping:Accelerating the Application of 3D Printing

Creating a prototype can be very expensive and slow process. Thankfully, some techniques are available to help and improve your product development process, allowing you to make high-quality prototypes with a lower-cost. 3D printing is the perfect solution to develop your prototypes and accelerate the new product goes to market. By starting to develop your project using 3D printing, the new product will go to market faster, while saving time and money. We are going to introduce you all our latest success cases about 3D printing prototyping to help you to implement 3D printing wisely in your produce development process.

Case Studies 1:3D Printing Technology Empower Architects to Produce 3 Meters Long Street-View Model within 48 hours

SoonSer 3D created a 3-metre-long street view landscape which included a cafe, church, house, shop houses, and pedestrian within 48 hours.

The project is completed by SoonSer Mars Pro 600 with LG6001 material. All printed figurine and models were sanded, assembled, and painted. SoonSer Mars Pro 600 had high printing precision that could ensure the dimension accuracy is within ±0.05mm. Along with LG6001 material, it ensures the 3D printed parts had high resistance to tear as LG6001 material had flexural strength up to 100Mpa.

In terms of professional benefit using 3D printed models to visualize the project, architect can monitor and examine the functional consideration of architectural models’ core structure such as overlapping and interlocking.

Advantages of using SLA technology for architectural modeling：Stereolithography (SLA) uses a liquid resin polymer that is cured using a UV laser. Very high levels of detail are achievable, and models are produced with smooth, durable surfaces. Some small scale desktop SLA printers are available on the market, but for full architectural designs, professional large-scale printers are more commonly used. A large build volume allows models to be produced as whole parts meaning less time spent hiding join-lines and less disruption to a model’s overall design.

Case Studies 2: 3D Printed Giant Shoes for Display

Visual communication played an important role in retail industry advertising. This is also why retail brand constantly update their display window. A retail brand can successfully attract potential customers through unique display item. To realize this strategy, 3D printing technology is critical in terms of time saving and deliverables’ practicability.

Crocs, the famous Hong Kong luxury sandal brand, recently used SLA 3D printing technology to print a batch of 1.2-meter-long beach sandal models to display in its flagship store to support its summer promotion event.

11 extra-large sandals were printed using SoonSer Mars Pro 600 with 9001 high performance material. The sandal size is approximately 1200*484*600mm upon assembled. 3D printing engineers split up the sandal model into 7 interdependent pieces. With SoonSer Mars Pro 600 accuracy up to±0.1mm, all parts can be easily assembled while ensuring the printed part maintained its dynamic features. The project uses 3 days to print out 11 sets of sandals, and post-process (sanding, coloring, polishing and assembling) took approximately 4 days to complete.

Case Studies 3: Customized mannequins with 3D printing

Creating an unique mannequins can be very expensive. The traditional way to produce a mannequin is by hand with clay or wood. With 3D printing, it can be finished much faster while the cost is significantly reduced, from several weeks of prototyping to a few hours of 3D printing.

One of our customers is a well-known eyewear stores located in Saudi Arabia who needs to produce customized mannequins for luxury eyeglass brand With the help of SoonSer 3D, they are able to print high quality mannequin within several hours now.

The mannequins show in the above picture was printed with SoonSer Mars Pro 600 and used resin 6001.They were printed in one piece with sanding, coloring, polishing etc. post-process.

Case Studies 4: High Spinal Tumors Surgical Models

At August, 2021, The neurosurgery teams of Shaoxing People’s Hospital successfully completed a highly difficult minimally invasive surgery for high spinal tumors with the multi-mode 3D printing.

The neurosurgery teams of Shaoxing People’s Hospital successfully completed a highly difficult minimally invasive surgery for high spinal tumors with the multi-mode 3D printing. The patient’s tumor was in the right spinal canal which is at the level of the first to the second vertebra, combined with imaging information, local high cervical spinal cord compression information can be seen, moreover, the tumor was close to the vertebral artery and important peripheral nerves and vessels, making it very difficult to remove.

After receiving this patient, the neurosurgery team in Shaoxing People’s Hospital immediately discusses his situation. The team proposed that 3D printing of the focus and surrounding tissue models in advance could provide great guidance for surgery so as to know about the anatomical relationship between the focus and surrounding tissue structure in detail and make detailed planning and guidance before operation. Subsequently, Director Yuan Zigang from the neurosurgery team urgently contacted SoonSer 3D. Encouragingly, not only can SoonSer 3D printer implement 3D printing of human tissues, but also can further implement multi-mode fusion technology jointly with its partnership to transform patient’s tumor image information from 2d image to 3d model, and carry out multi-mode fusion of various data.

The location and relation of cervical nerve, blood vessel and tumor were clearly and truly restored through 3D printing in vitro, which provides a basis for the formulation of surgical plan and make patients and their families more confident in the surgical plan. In order to ensure the safety of the patient’s operation, Yu Xuebin, director of the neurosurgery department, organized a team to conduct 3D printing model training and maximize the accuracy of the operation and minimize the risk of the patient’s operation.

The tumor was removed on the day of surgery. With the assistance of preoperative simulation, doctors accurately grasped the position relation among the tumor and the surrounding vertebral arteries, veins and cervical vertebrae, effectively controlled intra-operative bleeding, minimized the degree of vertebral wear, and completely didn’t affect the normal movement of the patient’s neck after surgery. Due to the minimal interference to the surrounding normal tissues, the operation time was greatly shortened and the surgical risk of patients was significantly reduced.

“We appreciated the models from SoonSer 3D, which allowed us to have a more vivid understanding before surgery rather than just a 2d imagination. The simulation training before the operation made me more confident about the operation and the success. The clinical application of 3D printing technology not only guarantees our safety, but also enables patients to gain health with the least cost and the minimum cost of surgical trauma. “This is the best thing we’ve ever seen.” Director Yu said.

The success of the cervical tumor operation in Shaoxing People’s Hospital not only witnessed the critical auxiliary role of 3D printing in medical and surgical surgery, which brought good news to the patients, but also provided a broader idea for minimally invasive surgery.

Case Studies 5: Customizing A Giant Model in 12 Days

3D printing technology emerged as a necessity in various industries for creating customized models. Especially in the field of entertainment, 3D printing allows designers to create realistic, detailed, unique, and replicable figurines, miniatures, action figures, character models, sculptures, film props, stop-motion models, art, and decoration at an affordable cost.

Minions and its Blue Car was 3D printed by SoonSer 3D

The giant blue car and fascinating Minions models were 3D printed with SoonSer large format 3D printer. Using large format additive manufacturing and rapid prototyping enable designer to turn idea into reality in just 12 days. The dimension of the blue car is 3600*1900*2500mm. To create this giant model, the project undergoes the process of disassembled, pieced, sanded, colored and assembled.

All parts of the project were sorted using designing software according to the part’s colors and functions. The splices are connected with a tooth structure. All parts are cut and printed according to the traditional FRP process to enable easy remolding. All 45 parts of the car were assembled and remolded once all the parts were 3D printed. Follow with polishing and coloring process, the splices were assembled once the color dried. The whole process only took 12 days, and with SoonSer advanced 3D printing materials, it could provide good finishing and toughness. 

3D Printed Blue Car Was Assembled

In total, what’s the benefit to produce big objects with SoonSer large format 3D printing?

• Fully-functional, full-scale 3D printed prototype. Building a large object would typically require multiple 3D printed parts that must be bonded or welded, and if the tolerance is off on one print then the whole part needs to be redone. Large format 3D printing solves this unique problem by simply starting and finishing the entire part during one print.
• Design and concept modeling. Once size limitation is no longer a factor, large parts can be produced at very low cost to simulate large products. Post-processing will bring the final model closer to the original product, and some of printed elements can be used as an end-use product.
• Custom unique models and tools. Traditionally all parts and models in entertainment and movie industry are made manually. Large-scale 3D printing dramatically reduces manual labor, saves time and costs compared to traditional processes. That’s why it offers freedom of creativity to design and produce customized products and elements

Case Studies 6: 3D Printed Giant Relief Wall Within 4 Days

SoonSer Mars Pro 600 printed a 2656.84mm*900mm*3620mm relief wall. Clear and fine details that surpass the artwork of a professional sculptor.

The conventional method to produce a relief wall will exhaust a lot of raw material and manpower, not to mention the cost of production. Highly complex sculptures possess greater difficulties to produce in conventional method, however with 3D printing technology, all those problems can be solved easily.

An experiment was conducted at an institute located in Guangzhou, China. The institute uses SoonSer 3D printer to fabricate a huge relief wall for indoor display. The wall is approximately 2656.84mm*900mm*3620mm with delicate lettering, patterns and curved lines. The finishing should consider aspects such as aesthetically pleasing, environmentally friendly, easy to clean and maintain.

Upon primary evaluation, SoonSer 3D printer engineer developed a blueprint with the following specification, wall thickness of 2.5mm and a back-brushed FRP to ensure the structure is not deformed. This design ensures the print result to be natural and curved surfaces can be joined accurately after polishing.

The challenges of the project were that the curvatures of wall joints, complex patterns and different font's texture which would have been impossible to achieve using conventional method. With industrial grade 3D printer and resin material enable the project feasibility.

Fabrication procedure: The whole relief wall was printed with resin, with a wall thickness of 2.5mm, reinforcement made, wooden supports installed, and fiberglass applied. The whole wall was cut into 72 pieces and printed in 4 days.

Customers choose SLA 3D printing technology because SLA technique enables the following features:

● fast delivery: Files are given and products can be received as early as the next day.

● Good accuracy: Minimum printing layer’s thickness as low as 0.05mm, with a maximum forming accuracy of 0.03mm/100mm.

●Multiple surface effects: The final products are suitable for various surface treatment processes such as sandblasting, painting, dyeing and plating.

●Large size: the largest single forming size can reach 800*800*600 (mm); currently there is 1.6m equipment 1600*800*600 (mm) available.

For more application, please contact us via: info@soonser.com, or visit our website: www.soonser.com