3D Platform announced an enhanced large-format 3D printer, the WorkbenchXtreme.
The company is well-known for its rather large 3D printers, with their long time flagship model having a massive build volume of near 1,000 x 1,000 x 500mm. That’s about half a cubic meter!
However, their new WorkbenchXTreme is even larger.
The build volume on this machine is a truly massive 1,000 x 1,500 x 700mm space, just over a cubic meter in size. I think we had best start reporting these machines in meters rather than millimeters.
But the WorkbenchXTreme is not merely the same Workbench machine with longer axes. The team from 3D Platform has also made several improvements that complement the larger print volume.
The print rate has been increased to 273 cubic mm per second, over 16X the rate of the previous machine. This is no doubt due to the fancy extruders recently released by the company, but certainly hugely valuable when 3D printing very large objects. Even a slight improvement in print speed can result in hours or even days of time savings. But these extruders should revolutionize the speediness of large prints.
They’ve upgraded the computer in the WorkbenchXTreme, and it now includes a touch screen and built in WiFi networking.
Finally, the machine has an optional full enclosure that should dramatically increase the success rate for large prints, which might otherwise warp badly in ambient air during the very long print process.
3D Platform also points out that the WorkbenchXTreme, like their other 3D printers, uses “open materials”, in that they do not require you to purchase proprietary materials from them at high prices. However, this also means you are on your own for determining the optimum print settings with random materials you may choose to run through the machine.
Such a large machine is certainly not for everyone; you must have a good business case for acquiring one. However, with the speed and volume improvements on this machine it will likely tip business case analyses over the top in some cases.
We’re hoping to get a good look at the machine this week in person.
Via 3D Platform
