Vat Photopolymerization Additive Manufacturing Resins: Analysis and Case Study

Abstract

Additive manufacturing processes have been developed over the last decades, especially vat photopolymerization (VP) processes, due to its simplicity and speed. The objective of this paper is to characterize commercial VP resins widely used for technical applications. Thus, test specimens were printed by Digital Light Processing and subjected to tensile, compression, flexural, hardness, and inorganic composition analyses. The resin with the highest resistance and hardness (containing 0.6 vol% of inorganics load) reached 53 MPa in tension, 110 MPa in compression, 79 MPa in bending, and 82.3 Shore D, which is comparable to injected polymers. A case study was made, replacing the injected gears of a reducer by printed ones and comparing the finite element analysis with resin properties. The characterization and case study results encourage the expansion of VP processes in the manufacturing of products in several industries and service sectors, as well as the development of new composite resins.

Stereochemistry-Controlled Mechanical Properties and Degradation in 3D-Printable Photosets

“…The UV-cured material that contained trans oligomers of ∼4 kDa exhibited a Young’s modulus ( E ) of 64 MPa, a yield point (σ y ) of ∼10 MPa and a strain at 30% elongation at break (ε b ) of 98% (Figure a). This behavior is typical of a stiff and moderately ductile plastic and is comparable to commercially available acrylic 3D printing resins . Conversely, the cis UV-cured material exhibited a Young’s modulus that is 50 times smaller than the trans material and displayed no yield point, typical of an elastomeric material.…”

“…This behavior is typical of a stiff and moderately ductile plastic and is comparable to commercially available acrylic 3D printing resins. 31 Conversely, the cis UV-cured material exhibited a Young's modulus that is 50 times smaller than the trans material and displayed no yield point, typical of an elastomeric material. Increasing the oligomer molecular weight within the resins from ca.…”

A review on the ceramic additive manufacturing technologies and availability of equipment and materials

“…In this additive manufacturing process, a liquid photosensitive raw material contained in a vat is selectively cured by light-activated polymerization [16]. The layers can be formed by scanning a laser (stereolithography, SLA) or by projecting the entire layer at once (digital light processing, DLP) [31,163,164]. This technology is best suited for small ceramic components for high-precision applications [6].…”

Development of material extrusion 3D printing compatible tailorable thermoplastic elastomeric materials from acrylonitrile butadiene styrene and styrene‐(ethylene‐butylene)‐styrene block copolymer blends

“…Additive manufacturing finds its application in various industries such as automotive, medical, electronics, aerospace, construction, and so forth 7–11 . There are various additive manufacturing processes available such as material jetting, 12 powder bed fusion, 13 material extrusion, 14 binder jetting, 15 sheet lamination, 16 and vat photopolymerization 17 . Among these techniques, the material extrusion‐based additive manufacturing (MEAM) is the most commonly used additive manufacturing technique for polymeric materials due to its versatility, convenient production rate, easy and inexpensive process, which makes it economical.…”

“…[7][8][9][10][11] There are various additive manufacturing processes available such as material jetting, 12 powder bed fusion, 13 material extrusion, 14 binder jetting, 15 sheet lamination, 16 and vat photopolymerization. 17 Among these techniques, the material extrusion-based additive manufacturing (MEAM) is the most commonly used additive manufacturing technique for polymeric materials due to its versatility, convenient production rate, easy and inexpensive process, which makes it economical. In MEAM technology, feeding material enters into the heated liquefier through a gear system, then the material gets melted at the printing temperature and molten polymeric material extrudes out from the nozzle and gets deposited layer-bylayer onto the build plate.…”