MIT also glass printing in 3D
The researchers of Massachusetts Institute of Technology have developed a process that allows to exploit the glass for the construction of objects with additive manufacturing of material.
3D printing is a practice that is gradually becoming more accessible, both in economic terms and for the availability of materials and tools easier to use. 3D printers are able to operate with a variety of materials, although the solutions closer to the user consumer normally make use of plastic filaments.
A group of researchers from MIT, is able to develop a process capable of using glass as a print material. The process, which takes the name of G3DP, it is to be understood now only as a laboratory experiment.
The process G3DP is described as a method of high accuracy to print transparent glass in 3D. The process provides for the possibility of adjusting the various print parameters to allow the creation of objects of different shape, color and transparency. The possibility of determining the thickness of the objects may also permit control of the transmission, reflection and refraction of light.
GLASS from Mediated Matter Group on Vimeo.
Unfortunately, there are available special technical details on the mechanics of the process G3DP: MIT simply speaks of a twin tube system heated placed one above the other. In the upper chamber, which acts as a ” furnace ” and houses the molten material necessary to the realization of a whole object. Through a nozzle with aluminum-zinc-silica glass melt is extruded into the lower chamber.
Researchers have made a series of items of furniture, aesthetically pleasing, which appropriately matched to a light source are capable of generating reflection’s atmosphere. The process could be used to improve the design of the optical fibers and their use by incorporating them in the construction of buildings.
