3D Printed Foam

[Whirligig Girl]

Is it possible to print something in very low density or porous materials like Styrofoam? I thought about this after wondering if Eucl3D could print a flyable spaceplane out of foam.

[Camacha]

Foam is chaotic in nature, while printing allows you to apply very controlled regular structures. It would probably be better to use that to your advantage. However, printing is rather slow and expensive when compared to mass produced materials, so often it makes sense to start from there.

By the looks of it ucl3D use pretty run of the mill 3D printers. Much more amazing things can be done nowadays

Edited April 4, 2015 by Camacha

[vger]

In the case of foam, it would probably be best to get a device that carves a shape out of a solid object. You don't need moving parts, so no need to bother with a 3D printer.

[Camacha]

You don't need moving parts, so no need to bother with a 3D printer.

3D printers are good at making complex or low volume parts. Moving parts are not a prerequisite. They obviously can make simple or high volume parts too, but in those cases other manufacturing techniques quickly overtake 3D printers in regard to cost and speed.

Edited April 4, 2015 by Camacha

[magnemoe]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallic_microlattice

Very strong for its weight but vulnerable corrosion and fragile if hit by something.

This is less an issue in space where stiffness and low weight is priority while corrosion and someone bumping into it is low chance.

Its made by an simple 3d printing like technique.

[Nuke]

i think subtractive techniques would work better for foams. cool thing about foams its fairly easy to use that as a base structure for application of carbon fiber composite. i know scaled composites does this to make filler cores for carbon fiber composite aircraft parts. i once used a power drill and some sandpaper to form a bock of foam into a nosecone for a model rocket, after a bit of epoxy and fabric had a fairly decent front end.

i know there are a few processes for converting the waste that this would create back into new foam stock for later machining.

[Bill Phil]

Depends on the foam. But I would say applying it or spraying it on are better methods for most cases.

[Ethanadams]

If you use that foam u can cast it with this trick.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGr_XoFTKmc

Jan 18, 2015 - Uploaded by Grant Thompson - "The King of Random"

[Reverberocker]

Hello, here is a guy building an airplane out of extruded polystyrene foam and using a DIY foam-cutter: http://www.rcfair.com/en/blogs/view_entry/13194/

I hope this information will be useful for some of you. Thanks for reading and good luck!

[Nuke]

now that i own a 3d printer im thinking that its possible to build lightweight aircraft parts out of pla. you can use the frame and skin approach. you can print the ribs, and use a wood dowel as the spar. you could 3d print spars i suppose, but you may have warping issues. printing the whole wing structure as one piece might be feasible on large printers, but warping again may factor into that. then once your frames are done apply some heat shrink film (careful not to melt the pla). and you should have a nice set of wings.

printing solid wings may be possible with very low fill density or exotic fill patterns. my $400 printer probibly couldnt handle it though.

Edited March 9, 2016 by Nuke

[K^2]

3D printer can handle printing foam. There are sufficiently flexible filaments available. It's all about how you convert the solid geometry into GCode. It'd take a custom program for sure, but it's nothing particularly insane.

I could probably write an STL -> GCode foam program if you guys really want it. Just don't expect anything fancy. I have a simple 3D printer with a single print head, so that's basically the extent of features I plan to support.

@Nuke, I wouldn't print wings. It's much better to print ribs, connect them to the spar(s) (e.g. aluminum tube), run some stringers, and then use a wing covering material specifically designed for RC, film or fabric.

I might have an OpenSCAD script for generating NACA profile ribs if you want it. You'll have to CSG subtract spacing for your spars and stringers yourself.

[AngelLestat]

if you want a special geometric shape for the foam, then yeah, 3d print can solve almost all structures.

But a much cheaper way to achieve a foam is using other techniques which creates random bubbles inside meanwhile the metal or material is cooling.
These materials provide high stiffness at very low density, higher melting point, they can even work as sound insulation, absorption of high impact energies regardless of the impact direction, electromagnetic shielding and vibration damping. 

 

 

[Camacha]

Someone printed a flying Spitfire model.

 

[Nuke]

3 hours ago, K^2 said:

3D printer can handle printing foam. There are sufficiently flexible filaments available. It's all about how you convert the solid geometry into GCode. It'd take a custom program for sure, but it's nothing particularly insane.

I could probably write an STL -> GCode foam program if you guys really want it. Just don't expect anything fancy. I have a simple 3D printer with a single print head, so that's basically the extent of features I plan to support.

@Nuke, I wouldn't print wings. It's much better to print ribs, connect them to the spar(s) (e.g. aluminum tube), run some stringers, and then use a wing covering material specifically designed for RC, film or fabric.

I might have an OpenSCAD script for generating NACA profile ribs if you want it. You'll have to CSG subtract spacing for your spars and stringers yourself.

my usual technique is to take an airfoil diagram and import it as a background in my modeling program (i use 3dsmax, since i know its ins an outs pretty well, i probibly should use a cad program proper though), and then trace it with a spline, then extrude that to make my wing rib model. it usually doesn't take more than a couple minutes. then i go about the trouble of punching out holes with boolean ops.

im using cura to print, haven't really had any problems with it yet that i couldn't solve by tweaking some parameters. ive already managed to print some ducted fans that work pretty well, give the motor enough voltage and it hovers. current project is a hovercraft, but thats stalled because i still havent found an old innertube in the dumpster (spring is comming!).

[DBowman]

printing something like this would probably be useful for printing something light and strong - it's mostly empty space and the different parts of the bone have different stiffness etc. It's a collagen fibre & mineral composite material. Maybe a carbon fibre + ceramic + polymer resin 'spun'/'printed' with a small scale structure suitable for the particular loads (mechanical and thermal) it will have to take.

I think foam is sort of by definition a pretty random bulk material formed from a collection of bubbles, the bone above is 'foamy' but not at all random - all the structure has grown in response to stresses in life (or at least to global plan modified in response to stresses in life).

[fredinno]

4 hours ago, DBowman said:

printing something like this would probably be useful for printing something light and strong - it's mostly empty space and the different parts of the bone have different stiffness etc. It's a collagen fibre & mineral composite material. Maybe a carbon fibre + ceramic + polymer resin 'spun'/'printed' with a small scale structure suitable for the particular loads (mechanical and thermal) it will have to take.

I think foam is sort of by definition a pretty random bulk material formed from a collection of bubbles, the bone above is 'foamy' but not at all random - all the structure has grown in response to stresses in life (or at least to global plan modified in response to stresses in life).

Like this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallic_microlattice

[DBowman]

12 hours ago, fredinno said:

Like this? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Metallic_microlattice

kind of, except bone goes further:

1. The micro latices is 'just' a regular 'crystalline' structure. In the bone each 'strut' is placed and sized so as to minimize mass and maximize strength given the loads actually experienced by the structure.
2. The bone is a composite and the collagen / mineral (fiber/polymer) ratio and fiber 'wrap' direction is also tuned for the actual loads experenced

I guess that micro lattice is just a 'demo'/'proof of concept' and could in practice be fabricated to provide #1. The metal vs composite is a different question, probably there are some applications where metal would be more suitable.