Characteristics and development of rapid prototyping

Rapid Prototyping (Rapid PrototypingManufacturing, abbreviated RPM), high-tech manufacturing technology is based on a material deposition method, it is considered the last 20 years, a major achievement in the field of manufacturing. It combines mechanical engineering, CAD, reverse engineering, layered manufacturing technology, numerical control technology, materials science, laser technology in one automatically, directly, quickly and accurately convert design to prototype with a certain function or direct manufacturing of parts , so as part prototyping, calibration, etc. the new design provides a cost-effective means of achieving. That is, rapid prototyping technology is the use of three-dimensional CAD data, through rapid prototyping machine, the stacked layers of material into a physical prototype.

Rapid Prototyping Features

(1) prototyping materials used are not limited to, a variety of metallic and non-metallic materials can be used;

(2) prototype reproducibility, high interchangeability;

(3) regardless of the manufacturing process prototyping geometry, more favorable when machining complex surfaces;

(4) Processing cycle is short, low-cost, independent of the degree of cost and complexity of products, general manufacturing costs by 50%, saving more than 70% of the processing cycle;

(5) a high degree of technology integration, to achieve the integration of design and manufacturing;

The practical application of rapid prototyping technology, mainly in the following aspects:

(1) Application of the new product design process of rapid prototyping technology to build a new product development model for industrial product design and development staff. The use of RP technology to quickly, directly and accurately design ideas into physical model has a certain function (sample), which not only shorten the development cycle and reduce development costs, but also enable enterprises occupy the first in the fierce competition in the market machine.

(2) in the field of machinery manufacturing technology due to RP own characteristics, so that it is in the manufacture of machinery for a wide range of applications, used for manufacturing a single-piece, small batch manufacturing metal parts. Some special complex parts, because only single-piece production, or less than 50 small quantities, usually can be molded directly by RP technology, low cost, short cycle.

(3) rapid tooling traditional mold for a long time and high cost. The rapid prototyping technology with traditional mold manufacturing technology, can greatly shorten the development cycle of the mold manufacturing, increased productivity, it is an effective way to mold design and manufacturing weaknesses addressed. Rapid Prototyping technology in mold manufacturing can be divided into direct and indirect molding molding two types of direct molding is the use of RP technology directly stacked to create a mold, indirect molding is a rapid prototyping system first part, and then copy the parts obtain the desired mold.

Rapid Prototyping Development Direction

From the current status of research and application of RP technology point of view, further research and development of rapid prototyping technology, mainly in the following aspects:

（1）Rapid development of good performance molding material, such as low cost, easy to shape, small deformation, high strength, durability and non-polluting molding material.

(2) increase the processing speed RP system and open up a parallel process for manufacture.

(3) rapid prototyping systems to improve reliability, increase their productivity and production of large capacity, optimize the device structure, in particular to improve the forming precision, surface quality, mechanical and physical properties of the member, provide a basis for further mold and functional assays .

（4）RPM high-performance software the development of rapid prototyping. Improve the speed and accuracy of data processing, research and development of the use of the original CAD data directly slice of ways to reduce the STL format conversion generated by the slicing process and loss of accuracy.