3D Scanning and Metrology

When one shops for a new sweater, one expects that the sweater should fit. If the sweater is too big, it’ll sag, and if it’s too small, it’ll feel tight. Producing high-quality surgical tools and medical devices requires precision akin to that of making products for aerospace components and semiconductors. Small irregularities invisible to the naked eye can compromise performance that may even lead to complications later in a patient’s recovery. As a company with a true blended workforce of scientists and engineers from manufacturing and practicing clinician-innovators, PrinterPrezz is committed to elevating manufacturing precision to the next level. PrinterPrezz employs advanced 3D scanners in its 3D metal printing process.

Being Precise

Using advanced manufacturing techniques with lasers and electron beams is only part of the whole equation when it comes to to producing next-generation devices. Owning a fancy printer doesn’t automatically make one an expert at manufacturing. After all, buying a Ferrari doesn’t automatically make one a racing virtuoso overnight. PrinterPrezz brings a wealth of experience by putting some of the leading minds in advanced manufacturing from the aerospace and semiconductor world and leading clinician scientists together in the same room to to ensure that our printers are calibrated precisely and run with part-specific optimizations.

Our commitment to precision manufacturing spans the entire production pathway and begins even with metrology of the raw source material, in our case, powdered metals. Metal powders for 3D printing are typically created by running a long strand of metal wire through a plasma and then atomizing the melted metal into a spherical powder. This atomization process generates a vast distribution of particles, large and small. Using electron microscopy and other specialized equipment, we can measure each lot of powder for consistency and other relevant characteristics to the application requirements. This process ensures that deices are produced as designers intended.

Finished parts can also undergo post-build analysis. By utilizing advanced 3D scanning and other metrology technologies such as Raman spectroscopy, PrinterPrezz is pursuing results that are more consistent and exacting, ensuring that the printed medical devices coming out of our facility match the original CAD specification time after time.

Being Fast

Our 3D scanners are also helpful before the first prototype. One of the challenges in traditional medical device manufacturing is the length of time it takes to go from a concept to a finalized product. The same 3D scanners that can be used to measure the reproducibility of our designs can also be used for reverse engineering as well as to iteratively optimized build parameters relevant to the finished product. Medical manufacturing combined with precision metrology—another chapter in the medifacturing story.

Our facility utilizes class-leading scanners, including:

HP David

• Resolution: up to 0.05% of scan size (up to 0.05mm) Scan Size: 60-500 mm
• Mesh density: UP to 2,300,000 vertices per scan

Open Technologies Cronos

• Resolution: detail ± 30 -60 μm
• Texture Resolution: 1.3 mp
• Volume capture zone: 61,000 cm≥

Cubify iSense

• Operating Range: Min: 0.40m, Max: 3.5m
• Scan Range: Min: 0.2m x 0.2m x 0.2m, Max: 3m x 3m x 3m
• Color image size: QVGA (320 x 240)

Creaform HandySCAN 300

• Accuracy: Up to 0.040 mm (0.0016 in.)
• Resolution: 0.100 mm (0.0039 in.)

Artec Leo

• Resolution: 0.25 mm
• Texture Resolution: 2.3 mp
• Volume capture zone: 173,000 cm≥

Artec EVA

• Resolution: 0.5 mm
• Texture Resolution: 1.3 mp
• Volume capture zone: 61,000 cm≥