What are the flavors of 3D printing?
Additive manufacturing – specifically, 3D printing – has been around for a long time and has taken on many forms. The picture below illustrates the range of 3D printing technologies currently available.
The options with a green background are categorized as personal printers and those with a pink background are categorized as commercial printers. Besides the obvious and significant cost differences, the commercial printers require highly trained operators and can produce objects made of metal and other exotic materials. The personal printers create objects using thermoplastics and photoresins. That’s not to imply that these plastic and resin-based objects are fragile or weak. They’re not, but they do have a more limited range of applications.
The personal printers come in two forms: FDM (short for Fused Deposition Modeling) and SLA/DLP (short for Stereolithography Apparatus or Digital Light Processing). FDM printers use rolls of thermoplastic filaments while SLA/DLP printers use bottles of photosensitive resins.
While SLA/DLP printers can produce objects with very high resolution, the objects are typically small in size and the resins are both expensive and toxic.
For the purpose of designing and creating assistive technology devices, FDM printers are the best choice.
Who can I turn to on YouTube when I want to learn more?
What 3D printers do you “currently” recommend?
What filaments do you recommend?
How do I obtain 3D-printed devices if I don’t have a 3D printer?
Where should I look for things to print?
How can I start designing my own 3D objects?