Simulation of Cartesian 3D Printer Machine

Introduction 3D Printing or additive manufacturing (AM) is an emerging and promising domain with huge potential in itself. It has gained attention of researchers, industrialists and academia from all around the globe. Under the banner of 3D printing, a number of different technologies exist together like Stereolithography (SLA), Selective Laser Sintering (SLS), Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM), Digital Light Process (DLP), Multi Jet Fusion (MJF), PolyJet, Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS) and Electron Beam Melting (EBM). Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) sometimes reffered as Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) is a 3D printing technique which is primarily based on extrusion of heated thermoplastic polymers via a nozzle. In FDM process, the layers are extruded on the layers in a pre-determined fashion in order to make the desired 3D shape.

Types of FDM 3D printers There is no hard and fast classification of the FDM 3D printers, but if we take a closer look we may classify them as Cartesian, Polar and Delta 3D printers.

  1. Cartesian 3D Printer: These printers are based on Cartesian system of three mutually perpendicular axes generally known as X-axis, Y- axis and Z-axis. In these printers, linear motion is exhibited along these axes.

  2. Polar 3D printer: These printers work on polar (R-θ) coordinates. The extruder assembly can move along vertical axis and print-bed can rotate as well as reciprocate horizontally.

  3. Delta 3D printer: In these printers the extruder assembly is suspended along three connecting rods making a shape of triangle, thus they are called delta 3D printers.