International Journal of Industrial Electronics and Electrical Engineering, ISSN: 2347-6982 Volume- 2, Issue- 3, March-2014 NEONATE: REINVENTING OPEN SOURCE 3D PRINTERS

1AMEY BAVISKAR, 2AMEYA JHAWAR, 3SOHAN MALEGAONKAR, 4ARTH VASAVADA

1,2,3,4Pravara Rural Engineering College, Loni, Maharastra Email: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Abstract— In this paper we are presenting a open source software Neonate, which is combination of two existing open source software OpenSCAD and Printrun using Slic3r and OCP (One Click Print) Paradigm. Neonate that allows the fast development of 3D objects for fabrication on 3D printers. Fabricating with Neonate helps user to easily modify, share or print the 3D objects. Usage of three different software just to print an object is an arduous job. Instead of choosing strenuous path for printing an object this paper allows user to use a single software. As a non searched result, we have observed that Neonate also helps users to save their time.

Keywords—Neonate, 3D Printer, Open Source, OpenSCAD, Printrun, OCP Paradigm

I. INTRODUCTION later, in May 29th the first replication was achieved. Since then, the reprap community (original reprap 3D printing is a technique of creating 3D solid objects machines and derived designs) has been growing of practically any shape from its digital model and exponentially. The current estimated population is using almost any material. With the use of additive around 4500 machines. The second reprap generation, manufacturing, it refers to creation of objects using called Mendel, was finished in September 2009. Some sequential layering. It is exactly opposite of traditional of the main advantages of the Mendel printers over subtractive process such as drilling, boring and many Darwin are bigger print area, better axis efficiency, other similar processes. The 3D printing technology is simpler assembly, cheaper, lighter and more portable. used for both prototyping and distributed Initially, both Darwin and Mendel were not designed manufacturing having applications in many fields. for the general public but for people with some technical background. As the reprap project was A. Fundamental Functioning open-source, small companies were created to start 1) Modeling with OPENSCAD: OpenSCAD which shelling these 3D printers, as well as derived designs. uses Object Oriented Mechanics Library (OOML) is a Computer Aided Design (CAD) III. 3D PRINTING METHODS that slices them into digital cross-sections for the machine to successively use as a guideline A. Stereo lithography (Sla) for printing. The first commercially available 3D printer (not 2) Printing using Printrun: Printrun is a interfacing called a 3D printer back then) used the software which sends G-code to the 3D printer stereolithography (SLA) method. This was invented and it consists of printcore, pronterface, in 1986 by Charles Hull, who also at the time founded pronsole and collection of helpful scripts. To the company, 3D Systems. A SLA 3D printer works by perform a print the machine reads the design concentrating a beam of ultraviolet light focused onto from G-code and constructs successive layers of the surface of a vat filled with liquid photocurable liquid, powder, paper or sheet material to built resin. The UV laser beam draws out the 3D model one the model from a series of cross-sections. thin layer at a time, hardening that “slice” of the eventual 3D model as the light hits the resin. Slice B. Preluding Neonate after slice is created, with each one bonded to the We are proposing an application “Neonate” which is a other, and next thing you know you have a full, combination of already existing open source software extremely high-resolution three dimensional model and offers user a better interaction with open source lifted out of the vat. Unused resin is reusable for the 3D printers. next job.

II. HISTORY OF OPEN SOURCE 3D B. Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) PRINTERS Also invented in the late 1980s, by Scott Crump, was Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) technology. With The aim of this project was to develop an open-source patent in hand, he and his wife founded Stratasys in self- replicating machine. In May 2007 the first 1988. With FDM, the object is produced by extruding prototype, called Darwin was finished and some days a stream of melted thermoplastic material to form

Neonate: Reinventing Open Source 3d Printers

5 International Journal of Industrial Electronics and Electrical Engineering, ISSN: 2347-6982 Volume- 2, Issue- 3, March-2014 layers. Each layer stacks on top of and fuses with the (EBM) which uses an electron beam instead of a UV previous layer as the material hardens almost laser. And then there is a completely different immediately after leaving the extrusion nozzle. It is technology called Laminated Object Manufacturing one of the less expensive 3D printing methods. Most (LOM), where layers of adhesive-coated paper, FDM printers print with ABS plastic (think Lego), as plastic, or metal laminates are successively glued well as PLA (Polylactic acid), a biodegradable together and cut to shape with a knife or laser cutter. polymer, which is produced from organic material. The actual term “Fused Deposition Modeling” and its IV. BUILDING BLOCKS OF NEONATE abbreviation “FDM” are trademarked by Stratasys. RepRap uses a similar process, but has called it “Fused A. OpenSCAD Filament Fabrication” (FFF), so as to not step on the OpenSCAD is a free software used for creating 3D trademark. With FFF, the material is fed via filament models which focuses on CAD aspects. It is the from a spool of the material. application used during CADing of 3D models of machine parts and is not used for creating computer C. Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) animated movies. OpenSCAD reads from a script file The 1980s were big for inventing 3D printing and compiles it to give you a 3D model. It provides us technologies. Not only were SLA and FDM invented with two modeling techniques, it uses constructive and patented then, but so was Selective Laser solid geometry (CSG) and 2D extrusion. Sintering (SLS), by Carl Deckard and colleagues at the University of Texas in Austin. SLS works 1) OOML similarly to SLA, but instead of liquid photopolymer OOML is a C++ empowered OpenSCAD. It is set of in a vat, you’ll find powdered materials, such as libraries that allows designer to creates mechanical polystyrene, ceramics, glass, nylon, and metals parts using C++. It includes all geometry operations including steel, titanium, aluminum, and silver. When required to manipulate objects in space. Geometric the laser hits the powder, the powder is fused at that operations such as point (sintered). All unsintered powder remains as is, and becomes a support structure for the object. The o Transformation lack of necessity for any support structure with SLS is o Translate: Translates (moves) the component an advantage over FDM/FFF and SLA — there’s none along the specified vector. to remove after the model is complete, and no extra o Rotate: Rotates the component child a degrees waste was created. All unused powder can be used for about the origin of the coordinate system. When the next printing. a rotation is specified for multiple axes the the rotation is applied in the following order: x, y, z. D. Photopolymer o Scale: Scales its child elements using the Object (acquired by Stratasys) developed this specified vector. technology: much like a traditional inkjet printer o Mirror: Mirrors the child element on a plane deposits ink, a photopolymer liquid is precisely jetted through the origin. out and then hardened with a UV light. The layers are o Modeling stacked successively. The technology allows for o Union: Creates a union of all its child nodes. This various materials and colors to be incorporated into is the sum of all children. single prints, and at high resolutions. o Difference: Subtracts the 2nd (and all further) child nodes from the first one. E. Syringe Extrusion o Intersection: Creates the intersection of all child Almost any material that has a creamy viscosity can be nodes. This keeps the overlapping portion. used in 3D printers equipped with syringe extruders. o Linear Extrude: Linear Extrusion is a modeling This includes materials like clay, cement, silicone, operation that takes a 2D polygon as input and and Play-Doh. Certain foods like chocolate, frosting, extends it in the third dimension. This way a 3D and cheese can also be printed with these systems. The shape is created. syringe may or may not need to be heated, depending o Rotate Extrude: A rotational extrusion is a Linear on the material; chocolate may need to be kept warm Extrusion with a twist, literally. Unfortunately, while silicone can be kept at room temperature. it can not be used to produce a helix for screw threads as the 2D outline must be normal to the F. Methods axis of rotation. There are other variants of these technologies. For o Hull: Computes the convex hull of child nodes. example there is Selective Laser Melting (SLM), o Minkowski: Displays the minkowski sum of which is like SLS but it fully melts the powder rather child nodes. than just fusing the powder granules at a lower temperature. This is similar to Electron Beam Melting

Neonate: Reinventing Open Source 3d Printers

6 International Journal of Industrial Electronics and Electrical Engineering, ISSN: 2347-6982 Volume- 2, Issue- 3, March-2014 o While in OpenSCAD all objects have the same OpenSCAD and also its dependencies. It can be semantic meaning. In OOML objects are divided changed, scaled, in the similar fashion of OpenSCAD. in 3 categories. This will help user from writing tedious code from o Primitive Objects: They are geometrical entities, scratch and can start using it from the already without a mechanical meaning, like a Cylinder available platform. The output of OpenSCAD a or a Sphere. rendered object is with the help of different methods in o Parts: They have a mechanical meaning in a OpenSCAD. Camera method helps to rotate the object complex thing, like a wheel or a chain. obtained via different angles. It is also capable of o Packages: They are a set of Parts making a more generating different output files including png,stl,jpg, complex thing. Like a Castor Wheel, which etc. CGAL gives the output rendered and OpenGL contains a Wheel and a support. They cannot be helps to draw the 3D image. Renderer file uses printed in one time. OpenGL to draw the 3D object and also for coloring it and shading it. As written entirely in C++ it has no external dependencies and thus can be used on any computer B. Incubation phase 2 having a standard C++ compiler.[1] The 3D model obtained from phase 1 is in the form of 2) OpenCSG stl file. This stl file is given to slic3r which converts it It is a library written in C++ which does image based into a G-code ie printrun readable format. The stl\_io CSG using OpenGL. Primitive shapes ie basic and file generates takes stl file as input and thus using solid shapes which are not a result of any CSG dependencies it converts it into a G-code equivalent operations are used to model complex 3D objects image. This G-code consist of arrays of the image. It is using union, intersection and difference. It makes use only to instruct printer where it need to print. of Goldfeather and SCS algorithm to render 3D model. [2] C. Incubation phase 3 The G-code thus obtained from phase 2 is used by B. Slic3r printrun which commands arduino microprocessor to Slic3r is a fully modular multi platform code written print. It also generates real time status of printer C++ and Perl. It is use to converts 3D models ie STL, including the amount of material needed the OBJ, AMF to G-code. It can be used with any Reprap temperature to be set and the print progress. based 3D printer. Along with this it also provides with Thus Neonate after this three phases becomes a ready 3D preview, cooling logic, standby temperature, STL to go, plug and play software. It do not need any other auto repair. software and is a complete package. It is observed that using this package has helped many user to overcome C. Printrun the difficulty to set up a printer. The integration of The outpur of Slic3r i.e. the G-code is given as an three different software and some basic most needed input to Printrun. Printrun checks for the online material makes it a complete suite. printer, baud rate, temperature, printer state, amount of ABS. It keeps track of printer while its printing. VI. OCP PARADIGM

D. Qt One Click Print(OCP) paradigm allows user to Qt is a cross platform application framework used to communicate with printer in just one click.User have develop application software using GUI. It uses C++ to just click the design and he/she will get the solid to write programs and uses other languages for code printed model.User can download designs and store in generator. It can be used widely to integrate different inventory and use it, modify it and share it. libraries of different source. Thus the targeted user can be amongst 7 different platforms VII. 3D PRINTING OFFERS MANY COMPITITIVE ADVANTAGES V. INCUBATION OF NEONATE A. Quicker Time to Market. Neonate is a combination of different open source The longer a product stays in the design cycle, the libraries. It is being observed that if these libraries are longer its time to market, meaning less profit for the combined into a single package it will benefit user. It company. Time-to-market considerations were would thus help simplifying the work of user. identified as the most critical daily issue facing respondents of a 2008 Product Design and A. Incubation phase 1 Development readership poll. In addition, this group In phase 1 Neonate will provide with the already said prototyping itself presented a time-to-market added 3D objects whom we can change or add at our obstacle nearly 17 percent of the time. With increasing will, this objects will be rendered with the help of pressure to get products into the marketplace quickly,

Neonate: Reinventing Open Source 3d Printers

7 International Journal of Industrial Electronics and Electrical Engineering, ISSN: 2347-6982 Volume- 2, Issue- 3, March-2014 companies are compelled to make quick and accurate Each year, a considerable number of new product decisions during the conceptual stage of design. These initiatives fail. In a business climate where many decisions can affect almost 80 percent of the product’s companies are asking employees to do more with less, total cost by establishing material selection, CAD solid modeling and 3D printing capabilities are manufacturing techniques and longevity of the design. essential for efficient product design development. 3D printing optimizes profits by shortening design With 3D printing, companies can experiment with processes. With 3D printing, companies can now new ideas and numerous design iterations, without build parts within hours, not days or weeks. extensive time or tooling expense, to determine B.Cost Savings. whether product concepts are worthy of additional The acquisition cost of a 3D printer can be as little as resources. $15,000 (USD) versus as much as $500,000 for a rapid B. feedback identifies design flaws. prototype machine, making them a good option for Successful product design requires review and input companies of all sizes. Annual operating costs are from many sources. With in-house 3D printers, design generally lower, too. teams can review concepts earlier with others who may provide feedback. This real-time collaboration C. In-House Convenience. with engineering, marketing and quality assurance 3D printing technology can create multiple, can lead to early quality suggestions, enabling ready-to-use models right from a desktop, making it designers to make adjustments throughout the design especially convenient for companies needing a high process and follow-up testing. number of models. The printers are versatile, yet easy to use and require no special training. Users just load C. changes save money. the printer software onto a Windows network and start Changes cost more the later they occur in the design printing. Most software accepts major 3D file formats, process. Early and frequent communication and including .stl, .wrl, .ply and .sfx files. Some also collaboration can reduce these costs. The diagram on accept CT and MRI diagnostic data, protein molecule the next page illustrates how the cost of changing a modeling database data and digitized 3D-scan data. product in the concept stage may cost only $1, but as the design progresses, so does the cost of making D. Data Security. changes. By the time a product is in production, the Everyone is concerned about security today, and while change that would have cost $1 in the concept stage sending confidential STL files to an outside vendor is now costs $10,000. generally safe, having a 3D printer in-house removes any worry about risking intellectual property. IX. FUTURE IS NOW

E. Rigorous Product Testing. 3D printing provides a highly cost-efficient means of 3D printers can produce models with fine feature producing numerous design iterations and immediate detailing, yet are strong enough to stand up to rigorous feedback throughout the critical beginning stages of testing. Because leading 3D printers use the development process. The ability to refine form, fit production-grade thermoplastics, companies can test and function quickly can significantly affect the form, fit and function for every design iteration. A production costs and time to market. This can create a true industrial thermoplastic, ABS is widely used in distinct competitive advantage for those companies thousands of applications. ABS models won’t warp, who include 3D printing as an integral part of their shrink or absorb moisture, and they can be drilled, design process. Lower costs will continue to expand tapped, sanded and painted. the 3D printing market, especially in schools and small to medium sized businesses. The speed, VIII. HOW DOES 3D PRINTING BENEFIT consistency, accuracy and low cost of these printers THE DESIGN PROCESS? will help companies reduce time-to-market and maintain a competitive edge. Today, 3D printers are used by designers and engineers for concept development and product CONCLUSION design. They help users and potential customers see and feel an actual part, rather than rely on their In this paper we have presented the Neonate which is imagination to bring a computer image to life. Models combination of different open source applications.Due are also used as a visual aid to support tooling to use of cross compiler Qt this application is platform development. independent and one click print paradigm makes it easy to use.This way of approach leads us to the world A) Design iterations are created faster. of opportunities which will change the pont of view of user for 3D printing.

Neonate: Reinventing Open Source 3d Printers

8 International Journal of Industrial Electronics and Electrical Engineering, ISSN: 2347-6982 Volume- 2, Issue- 3, March-2014 REFERENCES [2] F. Kirsch and J. Do llner, Rendering Techniques for Hardware-Accelerated Image-Based CSG, Journal of WSCG, 12(2):221-228, 2004. [1] Valero-Gomez, A. ; Robot. Lab., Univ. Carlos III de Madrid, [3] D. Bak, “Rapid prototyping or rapid production? 3d printing Leganés, Spain ; Gonzalez-Gomez, J. ; Almagro, M. ; Salichs, processes move industry towards the latter,” Assembly M.A.," Boosting mechanical design with the C++ OOML and Automation, vol. 23, no. 4, pp. 340–345, 2003. [Online]. open source 3D printers",Digital Object Identifier Available: http: :10.1109/EDUCON.2012.6201114 //www.emeraldinsight.com/10.1108/01445150310501190



Neonate: Reinventing Open Source 3d Printers

9