Formlabs’ new Form 4 flagship 3D printer is a bit different than its predecessors.
The company, now over a decade in existence, has previously incrementally improved their original SLA 3D printing technology. Starting with the Form 1, the company moved on to the Form 2 and more recently the Form 3. While these models were different, the base printing technology was similar.
The Form 4 strikes a slightly different technology. Instead of including a laser engine to solidify resin, the Form 4 uses a LCD light engine. The LCD engine illuminates the entire print surface all at once, rather than having the laser tediously trace through the entire object layer.
This alone makes the Form 4 a faster 3D printer, and should be more economical for Formlabs: lasers are expensive, LCDs are less so.
The LCD engine is clearly the biggest change on the Form 4, but it turns out a number of other features are also changed. Let’s take a look at them.
The resin wiper, used to slosh the resin in the vat between layers, now operates more quickly. While this may seem like a minor improvement, remember that this movement happens on each and every layer.
Another feature that was in truth a bit slow on earlier Form models was resin deployment. In those machines you would insert the resin cartridge, and it would very slowly fill the tank. With the Form 4 this happens much more quickly. This time saving feature isn’t part of every layer, but it is something that operators will benefit from.
Because of the LCD light engine, Formlabs has reformulated some of their resins — the chemistry must be a little different for optimal printing with the different form of light. The good news is that the price of the resin has dropped, from US$150 per liter to US$99. The price of resin tanks has also dropped.
With the changes, the Form 4’s price is approximately US$4500, with a US$5500 “all in” price for wash and cure stations to accompany the printer.
The changes to the Form 4 will certainly be welcomed by Formlabs customers, and should position Formlabs to compete against the increasingly capable machines emerging from Asia. While Formlabs’ pricing is higher than these competitors, Formlabs’ software and cloud environment is significantly ahead of the competition.
Via Formlabs
