If there’s one thing that’s annoying for those looking to take on 3D printing as part of their workflow, it’s got to be size. However you cut it, most ‘desktop’ printers are focussed on a pretty standard size of part.
Anything bigger than a 400mm cube, you’re looking at another level of complexity and expense, and if your bread and butter is big parts, then you’re out of luck – or more accurately, you’re looking at slicing and dicing your model which adds both time to the process and introduced inaccuracies in many cases.
Based in Rockford Illinois, 3D Platform has something that both looks fit for the workshop and give you a build volume that’s hard to match – the 3DP Workbench. This beast of a machine has just launched, has a 1,000mm x 1,000mm x 500mm (z height) platform.
When you consider that they’re claiming 1.25 micron resolution and 70 micron layer heights, this thing is impressive. It’s also built onto an interesting chassis that’s chock full of storage space that’s good for all of those reals of filament, tools and support removal devices, as well as a drawer for your elastoplasts that you’ll inevitable need breaking out part of that size.
How much? $27,000 (No price as yet for the UK from distributors, GoPrint 3D).
It isn’t cheap, but you’ll struggle to find that sort of build size elsewhere for that sort of cash. If there’s a downside, I’d suspect that having an unenclosed printer of that size is going to give you nightmares with part warping and lift, but with auto-bed levelling and some jiggery pokery, you’ll be golden.
