Replies to post #40417 on Liquidmetal Technologies Inc (LQMT)

[heavymetal]

so what if the base shape of the product is made by injection molding, then this block is now fine tuned by 3D printing on its surface for extreme precision of the final product. this should be faster because the added 3D printed portion of the part will be vastly smaller than than trying to 3D print the whole thing?

[funkjt]

Current 3D printing Technology is inherently slow. Whether it is FDM, SLS or EBM you are fusing very thin layers, which takes time. I don't see this being used for Apple type volumes.

I think a better use would be to make the injection molds by 3D printing. Molds take 45 to 60 days to make and cost 10s of thousands and up. Molds are complicated and often have convoluted cooling lines machined into them. These complicated shapes are no problem for 3D printing. If you could print a net shape mold in a day or two; that would be huge. Company's would be lining up for these short lead times.

A couple issue with this.
1. The resolution of 3D printing is no where near what is needed for a finished mold. Maybe you could print rough mold and finish with minor machining an polishing.

2. From what I've read BMG's do not like to be reheated, they tend to crystallize. A mold will need to go through a heat and cool cycle constantly.

Just a thought.