Roland monoFab P46 Siemens

Intel CoreNX
i7 7.0 P40 P55
vs Xeon Workstations P55

TECHNOLOGY FOR THE PRODUCT LIFECYCLE MARCH 2015 | £6 | € 7 | $10 | DEVELOP3D.COM

DEVEL
LIVE
M
OP3D

EVENarch 26
TP
pageREVIEW
32

FLOATING
ON AIR
Rotron engineers a lightweight drone
engine with phenomenal power

Test & simulation Spoon science Bluebird K7 project Trampolines

We chose the Stratasys uPrint machine
for functional prototype testing. This FDM technique
allows us to print plastic parts & attach motors.

Watch the video or call

to see how a professional 3D printer allows truly to discuss your application
functional prototypes to take flight at Aerialtronics: with our experts:

tiny.cc/drone-d3d +44 (0)1908 904367

 WELCOME
EDITORIAL
Editor-in-Chief
Al Dean
al@x3dmedia.com
+44 (0)7525 701 541

Managing Editor
Greg Corke
greg@x3dmedia.com
+44 (0)20 3355 7312

Digital Media Editor

Stephen Holmes
stephen@x3dmedia.com
+44 (0)20 3384 5297

Special Projects Editor

Tanya Weaver
tanya@x3dmedia.com
+44 (0)20 3384 5296

Consulting Editor
Martyn Day
martyn@x3dmedia.com
+44 (0)7525 701 542

W
DESIGN/PRODUCTION
Art Director
Rob Biddulph e have just over a month to go until DEVELOP3D
LIVE 2015 kicks off at Warwick Arts Centre. So, as
Design/Production you can imagine, it’s all hands on deck and to the
Greg Corke
greg@x3dmedia.com pumps (or something) as we head into that final
+44 (0)20 3355 7312 four weeks when things go right, things go wrong,
things get fixed and eventually, we’re joined by
ADVERTISING over 1,000 designers, engineers, educators, artists
and yup, a few software executives. Once the event
Advertising Director is underway, it all seems a bit of a blur, but in the
Tony Baksh run up we’re trying to ensure that you have a valuable day out in Warwick, meet
tony@x3dmedia.com
some new contacts, see some interesting technology and, of course, hear stories
+44 (0)20 3355 7313
from some amazing speakers.
Deputy Advertising Manager This year, we’ve got a curious mix of speakers — from rocket engines to the
Steve King wonderful world of artist and inventor Dominic Wilcox. I’ve seen Dominic present
steve@x3dmedia.com
on a number of occasions and I can promise it’ll be both entertaining and, more
+44 (0)20 3355 7314
importantly, inspirational.
US Sales Director We’ve also got a cracking exhibition running again this year. We’re excited
Denise Greaves to welcome back some DEVELOP3D LIVE regulars who will show what they’ve
denise@x3dmedia.com been working on in the past year, but we’ve also got a number of new companies
+1 857 400 7713 exhibiting for the first time with one in particular pushing itself to the limit to get
its first machine ready for the show.
SUBSCRIPTIONS Turn to page 32 for an extensive preview of what you’ll find on the day. We look
Circulation Manager
forward to seeing you there, for what promises to be our biggest and most exciting
Alan Cleveland event yet.
alan@x3dmedia.com You can get your free ticket at develop3dlive.com and stay tuned for more details
+44 (0)20 3355 7311 over the coming weeks!

ACCOUNTS
Accounts Manager
Charlotte Taibi
charlotte@x3dmedia.com
Financial Controller
Samantha Todescato-Rutland
sam@chalfen.com

ABOUT
Al Dean
DEVELOP3D is published by Editor-in-Chief, DEVELOP3D Magazine, @alistardean

Rooms 108 - 109, 4th Floor, 65 London Wall,

London, EC2M 5TU
T. +44 (0)20 3355 7310
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DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 3

 26 March 2015
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Learning-Zone-Advert-2014-A4.indd 1 10/06/2014 11:03

 CONTENTS

MARCH 2015 ISSUE No. 66

8 NEWS
SolidWorks unveils Industrial design tool, Teradici offers
free trial of remote CAD software, Ansys sets the bar high
with Ansys 16.0 and Autodesk to scrap perpetual licences

Comment
16 Jeremy Pullin on setting up a 3D printing facility aimed at
engineering education for non-engineers

18 YOUR DEVELOP3D
Tell us what you think. This month: CEO deathmatch at
DEVELOP3D LIVE and SolidWorks World bingo

FEATURES
20 Visual design guide: Vuly Thunder Trampoline
22 Product design showcase: Spoons
26 COVER STORY UAV rotary engines from Rotron
32 DEVELOP3D LIVE 2015 preview
40 Simulation Workshop: #7 FEA + Testing
42 3D printed carbon fibre parts at Champion Motorsport
44 HyperMILL 5-axis machining helps the Bluebird sail again

REVIEWS
46 Roland MonoFab
55 Novatech E5-1620V3 workstation
57 Scan 3XS GW-HT20 workstation
58 Lenovo ThinkStation P900 workstation

60 DEVELOP3D SERVICES

61 DEVELOP3D JOBS

66 THE LAST WORD

This month Al Dean discovers while working in his workshop
that the pursuit of perfection isn’t the be all and end all

The wood used to produce this magazine

comes from Forest Stewardship Council
certified well-managed forests, controlled
sources and/or recycled material

DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 7

 NEWS
NEWS PRODUCT DEVELOPMENT NEWS

SOLIDWORKS INDUSTRIAL DESIGN CONCEPT

(SW-ID) LAUNCHED AT SOLIDWORKS WORLD
» Next generation SolidWorks tool is based on the 3DExperience platform of
parent company Dassault Systèmes (DS), rather than the standard SolidWorks

I
n front of 5,500 attendees at its
SolidWorks World user event in
Phoenix, new CEO Gian Paolo Bassi
heralded the arrival of SolidWorks
Industrial Design (SW-ID).
Representing the next generation
SolidWorks tool, SW-ID is based on the
3DExperience platform of parent company
Dassault Systèmes (DS), rather than the
standard SolidWorks.
Previewed at SolidWorks World 2014 as
Industrial Conceptual, SW-ID is billed as an
ideation enabler, aiming to equip mechanical
engineers with ‘product design’ tools, as well
as enabling cloud-based workflows.
SW-ID is able to produce organic shapes
and concepts by developing sketches,
freeform Sub-D 3D modelling, feature-
based and direct 3D modelling.
The big news is the cloud-based teamwork
abilities, which allow users to collaborate
through a web browser-based interface. with a focus on A-Surface development, The product will cost $190 per month Cloud-based teamwork
abilities allow users to
Designers can chat with other users, exterior surfaces still need to be turned (£145 suggested UK price) with a 12-month collaborate through a web
share models and annotate in real-time, into engineered components so models commitment when it launches in April. browser-based interface
using the cloud for model sharing and will need to be exported to traditional For standard SolidWorks, also announced
modifications (using save and refresh). SolidWorks for further development. was SolidWorks Model Based Definition (MBD)
With control locking, individual users can How design changes can be for streamlining the generation and use of
be assigned responsibility for updating the accommodated is, as yet, unclear. engineering documents using a 3D annotation
model. “The needs of the CAD user community (or Product Manufacturing Approach/PMI)
Also new are the pen-based sketch have been a beacon of technological approach that is typically found in higher-
controls. Product demos at SolidWorks World innovation and we are committed end, enterprise level systems.
showed SW-ID working with a Wacom Cintiq to developing tools that respond to MBD allows users to generate one
multi-touch, reproducing a pen and paper evolutions in the product design process, master document for all product and
environment for fast concept sketching. from a technical perspective as well as a manufacturing information, downstream
Sketch options come complete with collaborative one,” said Gian Paolo Bassi, processes, and compliance with regulations
Photoshop-style shortcuts - hitting the shift CEO, SolidWorks. and standards without having to produce
key to instantly straighten hand drawn lines, “With SolidWorks Industrial Design and maintain separate sets of 2D
and ‘alt’ to curve them. and our 3DExperience platform, we want engineering drawings.
Sketches look similar to Catia Natural engineers to be able to rely on powerful, Engineers can define, organise and
Sketch and Catia’s Imagine & Shape modules, accessible technologies that facilitate their publish product and manufacturing
working on 3D planes (front, top, side) that work and result in significant business information directly in 3D (and
can continue to be developed as 3D models advantages.” associatively to the 3D model) with a view
within the SW-ID 3D modelling tools. SW-ID is the second SolidWorks application to improving communication between
This model can be built out using the to be delivered on DS’ 3DExperience design and manufacturing teams and
3D modelling tools, including SolidWorks’ platform, after SolidWorks Mechanical reducing the risk of errors.
own proprietary Sub-D system. However, Conceptual was launched two years ago. solidworks.com

ANALYSIS - FIRST IMPRESSIONS OF SW-ID of Autodesk Fusion and

SW-ID is the realisation
that the worlds of designer
and engineer are fast
combining, but it’s a
shame that DS is still
insisting that the two
disciplines are distinct and
separate.
While a bifurcation
of roles may be true in
automotive firms and
enterprises, for traditional
SolidWorks customers it is
uncommon for it to exist in
any rigid form.
Every sound bite at SWW
was about the age of the
entrepreneur and enabling
fast, fluid, collaborative
design. Perhaps now DS is
understanding that tools
for this new era of design
are needed fast.
What has really grabbed
the headlines is the move
to the cloud using DS’
3DExperience platform.
While cloud-based product
development tools are still
in their infancy, the launch
the soon to be unveiled
Onshape shows that
momentum is growing.
Price has also raised
some eyebrows, for what
is essentially an ‘add-on
product’ that has limited
interoperability with
the familiar desktop
SolidWorks (due to the
two products being based
on different foundation
technologies).
In terms of modelling
functionality, there appear
to be many similarities
with Autodesk Fusion
and Rhino. However, SW-
ID is an expensive buy,
especially when hitched to
the standard SolidWorks
product.
Stephen Holmes & Al Dean

8 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

Muncaster ad.indd 1 18/02/2015 08:45
 NEWS

TERADICI OFFERS FREE TRIAL Pro 3D graphics

OF REMOTE CAD SOFTWARE for rugged laptop

P
anasonic’s new Toughbook
54 is being pitched as the
thinnest and lightest semi-
rugged laptop in its class. It
is also the first rugged laptop
to feature CAD-focused 3D graphics —
thanks to an AMD FirePro M5100 GPU.
With a full magnesium alloy case with
handle and resistance to spills and drops,

T
eradici is offering a free
30-day free trial of its PCoIP
Workstation Access Software
that can be installed on any
Windows workstation with
Quadro K2000 graphics and higher.
The software allows users to connect
remotely to their 3D CAD applications over
LAN or the Internet — providing there is a
low latency, high bandwidth connection.
Unlike the company’s PCIe host cards,
which provide dedicated hardware for
compressing, encrypting and sending
IP packets over a network, the new
Workstation Access Software does
Teradici says set up takes under 5 mins — With Teradici's
users install the remoting software on the Workstation Access
Software you can
host workstation (Windows 7 or Windows
run CAD software
8.1) and the client software on the local PC such as PTC Creo
(Windows XP / 7 / 8.1 or Mac OSX). A PCoIP from anywhere
zero client can also be used.
The free 30-day trial is available in North
America, UK, Northern Europe, New Zealand
and Australia. The software costs around
US $240.
Meanwhile, BOXX has become the second
workstation manufacturer to sell Teradici’s
PCoIP Workstation Access Software.
The Austin-based firm joins Dell who has
been promoting the remote workstation
the mobile workstation is designed for a
semi-harsh indoor or outdoor environment.
It features a 5th Generation Intel Core i5
vPro processor and 11 hours of battery life
(18 hours with an optional hot-swappable
second battery).
Panasonic is currently working with key
software developers for CAD certifications.
panasonic.com
Delcam updates
inspection tool

everything in software. It is designed
specifically to work with 3D applications.
Teradici says it delivers outstanding image
quality and high performance 3D. Dynamic
quality adjustment and monitoring helps to
maximise frame rate.
The software is targeted at small and
mid-sized businesses in architecture,
construction, engineering and
manufacturing with limited IT resources,
and departmental deployments in
enterprises of any size.
D
technology alongside its Precision Tower
workstations since late 2014. elcam has released the 2015
Teradici refers to this latest BOXX deal as version of its PowerInspect
the next phase of its global rollout of PCoIP inspection system, the
Workstation Access Software. We expect to hardware-independent
see more manufacturers come on board in metrology software.
the coming months. Delcam lists new features as automatic
Meanwhile, to find out more about the collision avoidance, faster import of large
technology, read our in-depth report CAD files, quicker preparation of longer
tinyurl.com/tera-D3D inspection reports, and improved display of
Access the free trial at results from point-cloud data.
connect.teradici.com/30-day-trial delcam.com

DEVELOP3D.COM THE BEST FROM THE WEBSITE

Read Stephen Holmes'
SolidWorks World live blog
for equal helpings of new
technology, future visions
and dry humour
tinyurl.com/D3D-SWW15
Dr Robert Langer wins
the 2015 Queen Elizabeth
Prize for Engineering, for
controlled release large
molecule drug delivery
tinyurl.com/QEprizeBOB
Mastercam is looking
to improve shop floor
productivity with CAM
speed and automation in
its latest release — X8 Mill
tinyurl.com/newX8Mill
Pixologic has launched the
latest version of its ZBrush
modeller, release 4R7, with
new modelling options and
KeyShot 5 integration
tinyurl.com/4r7-keyshot
Version 4 of the Autodesk
T-Splines plug-in for Rhino
includes integration for
graphical algorithm editor
Grasshopper
tinyurl.com/RhinoGrasshop

10 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

 NEW

THE WORLD’S FIRST MOUSE

FOR CAD PROFESSIONALS

Right Mouse Button

Middle Mouse Button

Left Mouse Button

CadMouse
PRECISION ENGINEERING YOU CAN FEEL
The 3Dconnexion CadMouse is designed specifically for working in CAD. Say goodbye to repetitive mouse wheel clicking
and say hello to precision and comfort thanks to the advanced laser sensor and dedicated middle mouse button.
Stay in control with the Smart Scroll wheel and marvel at how you ever worked without QuickZoom that effortlessly
zooms to your point of interest with a single click.

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3Dx_Ad_CadMouse_A4_EN_v1.indd 1 18.02.15 17:34

MSI Ad.indd 1 18/02/2015 08:46

DEVELOP3D LIVE
set to be biggest
event yet
T
he expanded exhibition at
DEVELOP3D LIVE 2015 has sold
out weeks in advance of the
event with over 60 companies
set to showcase the very
latest in CAD, 3D printing, simulation,
workstation, design visualisation and
manufacturing technology.
The exhibition will feature all the major CAD
software developers, many of which will be
demonstrating how new cloud capabilities
will, both now and in the future, improve
on current tools. Onshape, founded by the
original SolidWorks team, will be giving first
public demonstrations of its new cloud-
based modeller and offering a free install to
delegates who bring a laptop.
There will also be an abundance of 3D
printing technology including presentations
from HP, low-cost sintering tech from
Blueprinter, stereolithography from
Formlabs, and 3D printed parts reinforced
Ansys extends focus to Internet of Things
F
rom simulating software and
hardware interactions for the
Internet of Things, to better
understanding the full spectrum
of advanced structural
materials, Ansys is setting the bar high
with Ansys 16.0, the latest release of its
flagship simulation platform.
Ansys believes that the increased levels
of connectivity needed for IoT require a
higher standard for hardware and software
reliability. In relation to this Ansys 16.0
features capabilities to verify electronics
reliability and performance throughout the
design process and complex electronics
industry supply chains. The biggest
introduction is the Ansys Electronics
Desktop, a single-window, integrated
interface that brings electromagnetic,
circuit and systems analysis into a single
working environment to help simplify the
Granta targets additive manufacturing
G
ranta Design's latest
software tool, MI:Additive
Manufacturing, is designed
to improve repeatability in
the additive manufacturing
industry by overcoming data challenges,
such as logging materials and process
information.
The MI:Additive Manufacturing workflow
begins by importing ‘logfiles’ directly from
3D printers. The system automatically
NEWS
ROUND
UP
3D Systems has been
awarded two research
contracts worth over $1
million dollars to develop
advanced aerospace
and defense 3D printing
manufacturing capabilities.
The contracts include the
provision of flight-worthy
with carbon fibre from Markforged — plus The DEVELOP3D composites and metal-
established technologies from Stratasys and LIVE conference and printed parts 
exhibition will take
3D Systems and a range of bureau services. place at Warwick 3dsystems.com
There will also be a massive array of University on
workstation technologies including the latest 26 March 2015
AMD FirePro GPUs, which can handle heavy 3D printing company
duty 3D graphics and compute tasks on a Solidscape and specialist
single card, plus a whole number of new wireless product designer,
workstations based on Intel’s Xeon E5-2600 LSR, are combining high
v3 series CPUs, including new machines from precision wax 3D printing
HP, Lenovo, Fujitsu, Dell and Scan. with LSR’s mould making
DEVELOP3D LIVE 2015 will be held at process. In the process, wax
Warwick University on March 26. Registration patterns are taken directly
is open now at develop3dlive.com to silicone tooling or to
cast metal parts without
See p32 for the event preview, which includes traditional hand finishing
details of the exciting conference lineup. solid-scape.com
Stratasys has expanded
its 3D printing material
options, with its FDM ASA
material now available in
process and ensure users are following eight new colours. ASA, an
simulation best practices. all-purpose FDM material
Ansys 16.0 can now simulate a wider that has a matte finish and
range of materials including sheet metal, is UV resistant, now comes
composites and elastomers like rubber, in red, orange, dark grey,
often used in seals and vibration dampers. yellow, green, dark blue,
Complex fluid dynamics has also been white and light grey
Ansys 16 offers
simplified with Ansys stating that simulation stratasys.com
the ability to
time for complex models in Ansys 16.0 has prepare designs
been reduced by up to 40 per cent. for the Internet
Ansys 16.0 also provides enhanced of Things through Dell's new slimline 15.6-
capabilities for developers of systems and serious simulation inch mobile workstation,
work — including
embedded software. Extended modelling the Dell Precision M3800,
electromagnetic
capabilities are said to enable hardware and disturbances like includes an optional 4K
software engineers to define the intricacies in this humble Ultra HD touch display, a
of a system and its subsystems operations. domestic kitchen Thunderbolt 2 port and
Also new is Ansys AIM, an immersive additional storage options.
simulation environment designed to The touch display (3,840 x
lower the barrier to entry for multiphysics 2,160) is made with Corning
simulations. Gorilla Glass NBT and has
ansys.com ten-finger multi-touch
dell.com
UberCloud has launched
new application containers
for CAD simulation
stores process parameters, extracts tools such as ANSYS
logged data for specific builds, links this Mechanical and LS-DYNA
information to supplier data on the batches and LS-PrePost, for CD-
of material used to make a part, and adapco STAR-CCM+. The
captures testing and inspection results. ‘containers’ are portable
This data can feed into statistical analyses between in-house and
that determine mechanical properties, cloud environments for on-
which can be exported to simulation codes demand access
and the results can be captured for use in theubercloud.com
optimising part design and production.
grantadesign.com
DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 13
 NEWS

AUTODESK TO SCRAP SINGLE New mouse for

PRODUCT PERPETUAL LICENCE pro CAD users
» Autodesk is embracing the cloud and fundamentally
changing the way companies buy and use its CAD tools

F
rom 2016 it will no longer

be possible to buy perpetual
licences of Autodesk’s
individual products as the
company starts to move
customers to a pure subscription
service. It will, however, still be possible
to acquire perpetual licences of Suites
for some time after.
The bold decision to remove the option of
buying and owning individual products is
great news for Autodesk as it can cut down
on piracy, maintain the price and margins
around the world and claw back revenue
given to its sales infrastructure of dealers
and distributors.
However, customers that have stuck to
three year upgrade cycles may not be so
receptive. While Autodesk will hope to bring
as many of these on board with desktop
subscription pricing versus perpetual
ownership with maintenance, those that are
used to upgrading at their own pace may
not be so happy with this enforced change
and choose to seek out alternatives.
3
notice to this transition and will offer
flexible terms to those who have individual
perpetual licences, such as multi-year
subscription deals and no charge for
maintenance. The company will also offer
additional programs.
Having said that, Autodesk’s cloud
offerings and subscription roll out appear
to still be embryonic in many places and the
company has yet to find the right amount
of features when compared with the
Dconnexion has launched a
classic style 2D mouse designed
specifically for CAD users.
The three-button CadMouse
features a dedicated middle
button (for model pan / rotation or
short cuts), a gesture button (to access
favourite commands via an application
or environment-specific radial menu) a
QuickZoom single click thumb button (for
‘effortlessly’ zooming in and out of your
geometry) and a Smart Scroll wheel, which is
said to deliver precise click-to-click zooming
in CAD applications or speedy scrolling with
inertia effects in browsers and documents.
3dconnexion.co.uk
Learn about CAD
virtualisation

The company has already announced
subscription and term licensing and has
moved elements of product fulfilment to
web delivery and added services to its
offering within the subscription package.
Andrew Anagnost, Sr. VP, industry
strategy and marketing at Autodesk, the
man behind the company’s evolving model,
told DEVELOP3D that desktop subscription
with cloud services provided a better
customer experience versus shipping just a
boxed product.
It is easier to deploy software, simplifies
upgrades and offers more flexible
access to tools and new workflows. The
company is also offering a range of new
on-line ‘cloud’ services for collaboration,
rendering and analysis.
Autodesk is giving the market a year’s
T
subscription fee to please the masses. In
the creative software industry, the speed of
Autodesk's subscription transition is second
only to Adobe's.
The changes to the dealer and
distribution channel will be interesting,
as over time many of these have been
weaning themselves off boxed product
revenue and turned more to training and
offering services.
Meanwhile, as of 13 March 2015,
Subscription Center, the online site where
Maintenance Subscription customers have
historically accessed their Subscription
benefits, will be retired. All customers
will be directed to Autodesk Account, a
personalised portal where customers can
track and manage all of their Autodesk
products and services in one place.
he writer of a thesis exploring
cloud, remote graphics and
virtualisation is calling for
professional CAD/CAM users to
participate in a short survey.
The resulting data will help gain better
insight into the adoption of these new
technologies. All participants will get a free
copy of the report.
The thesis will focus on the latest
developments from Nvidia, Citrix and
VMware in the area of 3D capable high-end
virtual desktops, as well as SaaS (Software
as a Service) based CAD/CAM solutions,
that will make high-end 3D applications
available for designers at any location on
any device.
surveymonkey.com/s/designerworkplace

THE BEST FROM DEVELOP3D.COM

Ansys has acquired NTI,
an in-flight icing simulation
software developer who
supports a safety-critical
aspect of aircraft design
tinyurl.com/D3D-icey
The Leatherman Tread
multitool bracelet features
25 links that offer a range
of tools — small bottle
openers, screwdrivers etc.
tinyurl.com/D3D-Leatherman
Ricoh Europe is now a Unilever is using a LightWave 3D has launched
reseller of the Leapfrog Stratasys Objet500 Connex its 2015 edition of its end-
Creatr HS 3D printer and 3D printer to produce to-end production pipeline
will focus on customers in injection mould tools for with new updates for
the education sector first consumer testing designs product design renders
tinyurl.com/Leapfrog-Ricoh tinyurl.com/Unilever3D tinyurl.com/LightWave15

14 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

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 COMMENT
A 3D printer can be a powerful
machine to have in an educational
workshop as long as that workshop
also contains other, non-additive,
means of manufacturing /
fabrication, writes Jeremy Pullin
R
ecently I have been
involved in discussions
about setting up
a facility aimed at
engineering education
for non-engineers. The
idea in brief is to set
up a classroom next to
a workshop containing a bunch of kit
which can be used to make prototypes,
models etc.
Amongst the kit planned to go into the
workshop are a few desktop 3D printers,
which got me thinking about the advantages
and disadvantages of 3D printers as
educational tools for engineering.
The first thing to consider is what you are
trying to teach. If you are getting a bunch
of kids to design bodywork for remote
controlled cars, whistles or cup holders then
it’s a great fit for banging out lumps of plastic
in the appropriate shapes required.
If however you are teaching software
programming, forging or computational
fluid dynamics then it’s no use to you at
all. The grey area comes when you start
talking about the design of non-customised
products, which are going to be produced in
their thousands or more.
The biggest advantage that 3D printing
brings in this case is the fact that it allows
non-engineers to actually make things by
lowering the bar to the skills and knowledge
required. It’s no exaggeration to say that
there are people around who can produce a
16 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
The importance of being able to
actually make things should never
be underestimated. This is especially
true when you are learning

plastic turbo impeller using a 3D printer but
cannot saw in a straight line with a hacksaw.
The importance of being able to actually
make things should never be underestimated.
This is especially true when you are learning.
A second advantage is the reduction in
learning time. The time required to become
competent at operating a desktop 3D printer is
nothing compared to that which is required to
become competent at using the kit you would
have had to use if you didn’t have one. If you
are teaching on a finite time budget, this frees
up more time to cover other subject areas.
The versatility of a 3D printer is another
big advantage. Its ability to produce a myriad
of forms means that it takes the place of
multiple more specialised pieces of kit. This
saves workshop space and means less pieces
of kit to buy when setting the workshop up.
Another massive advantage of 3D printing
Pupils from Watford compared with traditional fabrication is
Grammar School for safety. There was a time not so long ago when
Girls being shown the schools did not have technicians to drill holes
difference between a for the kids using the nasty scary pillar drill
consumer 3D printer
thing, the kids did it themselves along with
and a professional
machine during a visit milling, turning, forging, casting etc.
from LaserLines Now of course we live in a compensation
culture where personal injury lawyers point
the shotguns of blame at the rabbits of
employers and educational establishments as
they dive for cover behind the grass mounds
of health and safety. Technologies such as
3D printers and laser plotters offer a safe
alternative meaning that things can be made
despite the ever prevalent health and safety
rules and regulations.
Of course as for just about everything in
life, there are cons that go with the pros. The
most obvious one has to be expense. Desktop
machines are easy to get hold of and keep
getting cheaper and cheaper but running costs
do not come down at the same rate. While
these costs may not be prohibitive, they do
not compare well to standard raw materials
such as pieces of wood or sheets of plastic.
The next issue is time. 3D printers may well
be the fastest solution for things that would
otherwise take several stages to produce
but when it takes 30 minutes to 3D print a
washer (assuming you already have a CAD file
and can’t use an off the shelf one) it does not
compare well to the 2 minutes that it would
have taken you to laser cut it or turn it on a
lathe. A print time of a couple of hours is no
use to you if you are running a 1 hour class.
Another big disadvantage is the lack of
design for manufacture. DFM is crucially
important and can make or break the
viability of a design as a product. The idea of
freeing designers from a world of constraints
into a world of endless possibilities where
they are limited only by their imagination
is one created by the unconscionable and
perpetuated by the unknowledgeable.
Although design for 3D printing rules exist,
they are different from design rules for more
conventional production processes. The
danger here is that parts progress from the
virtual (i.e. CAD) world to the physical world
without encountering the constraints of the
processes that will be used to make them if
they become non 3D printed products. It’s
easy to see how this can ingrain bad design
practices into the pupils.
In conclusion, 3D printers are a great
thing to have in an educational workshop as
long as that workshop also contains other,
non-additive, means of manufacturing /
fabrication. For educational purposes they
should never be used in isolation. The most
important lesson (by far) that should be
stressed is that just because your design can
be 3D printed it doesn’t mean that it is correct
for series production.
Jeremy Pullin is the rapid manufacturing
manager for Renishaw, having set up and
now in charge of its pioneering Rapid
Manufacturing Centre. He can be found
tweeting as @jezpullin
All views expressed here are Jeremy Pullin’s
own and not necessarily those of his employer
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 FEEDBACK

Your DEVELOP3D
» Your views on Autodesk dropping its perpetual licensing system, 3Dconnexion's
CADmouse, CEO deathmatch at DEVELOP3D LIVE, and SolidWorks World bingo
This is an interesting move and one I and collaboration performed: via standard
support, but on the face of it are Autodesk PLM application and conventional CAD
assuming that ALL users will have an concurrent engineering with one check-
unrestricted access to the internet? out at a time or can the cloud CAD enable
Corporates which require high level concurrent access of several designers to a
of security around internet access will same design live?
be less than willing to open up just to Philippe Pradoura, Schneider Electric
accommodate a CAD application. It’s often
impossible to get simple functions like When you run conventional CAD applications
software activation to work correctly with on Mainframe2, they behave the same way
high security measures in place, so I’d be as they would on a PC. Great thing about
interested to see how they expect to tackle it is that all apps will work without any
this. modifications: SolidWorks, Inventor, or
TimC Solid Edge. But it also means that you bring
your designs in the same way (checkouts
Editor's letter: Celebrity and all). Multiple users can collaborate on
CEO Deathmatch Mainframe2, but they will look at the same
DEVELOP3D FEBRUARY 2015 design.
Software executives in leotards and gimp Nikola Bozinovic, CEO, Mainframe2
masks is EXACTLY what we really want to see
in Warwick this spring. Robox desktop 3D printer
Please inform the editor of this mistake. upgrade for AutoMaker
Clive Bagley develop3d.com
I had a chance to play with the beta version
3DConnexion swaps hands and the UI is clearer to use and produced
with its new CADMouse great results with just the default settings.
DEVELOP3D.cOM The cloud import worked well and I quickly
That Sun infrared mouse brings back found a useful item to print.
memories! I remember being on placement Andy from Workshopshed
Got an opinion on Stephen Holmes and his working on IDEAS and thinking it was an
anything that has SolidWorks World Bingo amazing piece of tech, with the gridded Gian Paolo Bassi named new
(or has not) appeared
in DEVELOP3D? Let us
Twitter metal mousemat too. CEO of SolidWorks
know what you think I'm getting close to #SWWBingo. All I need Mike W develop3d.com
Greg Corke is a sighting of @gpbassi in Cowboy outfit Paraphrasing what he said “access to
greg@x3dmedia.com and I win! I’m just disappointed that it doesn’t feature information anywhere, anytime on any
Facebook @WillRadiganPE any of their 6D tech in it, which would have device” almost a direct quote from #Onshape
/develop3d been a *real* category changer! Devon Sowell
Twitter One of the funniest things I have seen in a Jonathan
@develop3d long time. Well done. Pet products: Frogs
Web @ajkelly Mainframe2: DEVELOP3D FEBruary 2015
develop3d.com CAD in the cloud "Ever wanted to keep a pet frog but never
Linked In Autodesk to scrap its DEVELOP3D DEC/Jan 2015 been sure what to put it in?" No, no I
DEVELOP3D group
perpetual licensing system If we run the standard CAD application in haven't! #NewEngineeringProblem
Letters may be edited DEVELOP3D.COM the cloud, how is the CAD data management Rachel Berry @rhbBSE

60 second Why did you become a designer? 
 What design would you have Is there anything that would a fascinating man — I need to know
interview To be honest, I don't see myself
as a designer. My professional
loved to have designed and why? 

Whatever I am working on at any
make your design process run
smoother? 
more about that punching a polar
bear in the face incident...look it
Lloyd background lies in production given time. It’s important to love I have a very small and brilliant up! My wife, children, father and Al
Pennington engineering and, following work what you are doing more than team, so for me, it is always more Dean (chuckle).
in this line, I was offered a design anything else. Even if in hindsight I brilliant people.
position. Unsatisfied and frustrated always feel that I could have done Lancashire born Lloyd Pennington has
with being employed (or vice better. What would you say is the been making things all of his life
versa?) I decided to follow a route biggest challenge facing as a result of his dad making things all of
of self-employment in the design Play-Doh, Meccano or Lego? designers? 
 his life. Making things is something Lloyd
engineering sector. Easily Lego, despite the fact that I I think it's solving manufacturing, possesses as an instinct. Having worked
need my teenage son to program human, finance, sustainability as both an employee and an employer in
Which designer or company do Mindstorms these days! issues etc....and maintaining the engineering and manufacturing sector
you most admire and why? 
 balance at the same time.  over the years, Lloyd now steers a
In my heart, my dad. The man was What are your weapons of choice? successful design and manufacturing
(and is) a genius at just cracking on Depends on the size of the victim. Can you predict any future company which he says is about to
and making things, out of anything. trends? revolutionise the machine tool industry.
If you really want me to name a What is missing from your toolset?  No....otherwise I would be a lot
company, then it’s Renishaw.   Funny you should ask. A high speed, richer than I am now. See Lloyd at DEVELOP3D LIVE on March
  high fidelity, cheap to run, easy to 26 on stand 64 (Muncaster Technologies)
What product couldn’t you live use, tool for making prototypes.... If you were hosting a dinner party
without? 
 would you like one ? [Ed - see who would you invite and why? 
 If you want to take part please
A computer. muncastertechnologies.com] Brian Blessed, who wouldn't? What contact tanya@x3dmedia.com

18 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

 When it comes to
moulding, we’re flexible.
Introducing quick-turn liquid
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Proto Labs

Join us at
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Protolabs Ad.indd 1 16/02/2015 14:56

VISUAL DESIGN GUIDE Vuly is an Austra
Andon with the a
vuly thunder world. Seven yea

Brief
Vuly commissioned Australian industrial design
studio D3 Design to help it design Thunder. “The
brief was to design the best trampoline in the
world. A bold target and to achieve it we needed
to completely rethink what a trampoline was,”
says David Francis, D3’s creative director

Ease of use
Joe Andon’s mantra of simplicity and ease of
use meant that the designers were constantly
challenged to reduce the complexity and
number of parts. The end product consists
of only seven different components with no
fasteners needed for assembly

Safety
Safety was a key driver for the project. The
traditional hard steel frame, which can
cause head impact injury, was removed and
instead a mat support system was developed
which would give way under pressure

Leaf spring system

The leaf spring system was inspired by nature —
specifically a tree with its solid trunk and smaller
branches higher up. Similarly, each leaf spring
consists of three laminated leaf springs of different
lengths that become thinner and more flexible the
further they are from the base and closer they get to
the mat allowing for a good bounce

20 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

alian brand that was started by 25-year-old Joe
aim of creating the best trampolines in the
ars later, its most recent offering is Thunder
DeSign
proCeSS
With complex design and
engineering challenges
involved, the project was a
sequence of think, sketch,
draw up, prototype, test and
evaluate and then refine again
CuSHioneD
Thunder has a soft-edge to
help cushion tumbles and spills
as the hard frame and coiled
springs of a typical trampoline
have been removed
BounCe
To deliver better bounce,
the design team created a
progressive rebound system to
allow for plenty of air time and
no lateral movement making it
kind on knees and joints
frame
The strong dual-frame
design is resistant to rust,
scratches and cracks
priCe
Available to purchase in
the UK for £899.99
vulytrampolines.co.uk
BACK tO
BASICS
CUrVED
DISPLAyS
Curved screens? That’s just a gimmick
to sell more TVs, right?
In some ways, yes. As far as TVs go,
we’re not at all convinced, but we do
reckon there’s some mileage with
professional displays.
Well, go on. Please tell….
Curved screens are supposed to offer
an ‘immersive’ experience. But if you’re
ten feet away on your bashed up sofa
watching Eastenders, you’re hardly going
to share a moment with Dot Cotton. You
need to be in a controlled environment.
Like in the Queen Vic when Peggy
Mitchell ruled the manor?
Not quite. We were thinking more like in
an office, sat at an ergonomic desk.
Ah, I’m starting to see where this is
going. So what are the benefits for CAD?
With a 34-inch screen directly in front
of you, it’s possible to properly immerse
yourself in your 3D designs. And with
an extra wide 3,440 x 1,440 resolution
screen you can also flank your modelling
window with supporting apps.
Sounds a lot like my dual screen CAD
workstation.
It is. But instead of having an annoying
gap between displays you get one
continuous screen to do with as you wish.
So what models are curved?
Check out the Dell UltraSharp 34
Monitor U3415W (pictured) or the HP
ENVY 34c (also called the Z34c).
Are there any downsides?
Some say curved screens and CAD
geometry don’t mix. It could give you a
distorted view of the world — a bit like
Ian Beale after spending a lifetime of
misery in Albert Square.
 SPOON SWOON
W
hen baking we often need to
spoon and scrape in quick
succession. Instead of dirtying
two utensils, now there is one that will do
both jobs. The Swoon is an offset spatula
spoon from London-based kitchen brand
üutensil.
“Swoon is part of a new hand tool range
with each tool doing at least two jobs,”
explains Gavin Reay, founder of üutensil.
“We are not trying to force two functions
together, they are functions you would
conceivably be using at the same time.”
üutensil was formed in 2009 by Reay, an
industrial designer and director of London-
based consultancy And Design. With
four children, he was inspired to create
functional kitchen tools that reflect how
people really live and cook.
» Manufactured with advanced
materials, these hi-tech utensils would
be more than a match for spoon bending
guru Uri Geller, writes Tanya Weaver
PRODUCTDESIGN
SHOWCASESPOONS
Starting out with the Spudnik potato
masher, today the üutensil product range
has grown to around 20 tools, which are
sold worldwide.
The Swoon design process began with a
discussion between Reay, the design team
and the marketing director. From there,
sketches were formed with one or two then
modelled in SolidWorks.
The final design features an offset
spoon head and a silicone edge that has
been bevelled for scraping along the side
of a bowl or pan – Reay calls this the
windscreen wiper effect. The soft non-slip
handle also has a rest built in to prevent
the spoon slipping down.
“With this product, once we had gone
past the CAD and 3D printing stage,
we went straight to a silicone tool. We
3D printed some nylon spines that we
over moulded with the silicone tool. We
then pretty much had a finished product
without having to do any injection
moulding.
“Obviously with the final product, the
spine is injection moulded but doing it
this way helped speed up the process and
meant we could start photographing and
marketing the Swoon before production
was complete,” says Reay.
Swoon is part of üutensil’s hand tool
range along with the Flipp – a turner,
drainer and grater in one – and the
Pinch++ kitchen tongs. “These products
form the back bone of the hand tool range
that we are going to bring out over the next
couple of years,” says Reay.
üutensil.com
 PROFILE

The Swoon spoon has an offset

spoon head that allows for a
straight working edge down the
handle. When baking, the user can
scrape the bowl before spooning
the mixture into the tin

DEVELOP3D MONTH 200X 23

Spoon for all

W
ith its deeper cavity to hold
contents securely, the S’up is a
perfect spoon for shaky hands.
The project began as a design exercise
between Mark Penver, an intern at
Glasgow product design consultancy 4c
design (now a permanent member of staff)
and Grant Douglas, a man with cerebral
palsy, to create a one-off prototype.
From sketches, Penver moved quickly
into SolidWorks creating a range of spoon
heads and handles.
“We worked a lot on the curvature of the
handle. So when the spoon is on the table
there is a larger area to grip because it is
raised off the surface,” explains Penver.
When Douglas received his final
prototype, it transformed his eating habits.
With such positive feedback, 4c Design
decided to try and bring the S’up Spoon
to market in the hope that it could do the
same for other shaky hand sufferers.
To fund the aluminium tool for the
injection moulding process 4c Design
launched a Kickstarter campaign.
“We’re currently building a new business
plan around it and Grant is taking on a
huge part of that,” says Penver.
“We’ve also done a round of vacuum With its deeper cavity
cast prototypes so we can start doing to hold contents more
trials before we buy the expensive tooling securely and reduce
spillage, the sleek, matte
and build interest around the spoon,” black S’up Spoon offers
says Penver. a new perspective on the
supspoon.com traditional spoon

Outdoor spooning

W
hen camping, you don’t want to
lug loads of different utensils into
the great outdoors. So, the San
Francisco-based outdoor company Alite
alighted upon an innovative idea – a three-
in-one cooking utensil set, where a spoon
and spatula combine to form tongs.
In designing the Clover Cook Set, Alite
asked as many people as possible about
how utensils could make it fun and easy
to cook outdoors. The overwhelming
feedback indicated that most wanted
simple to use, yet multifunctional utensils
that were easy to transport and store.
“Armed with this information, we put
pen to paper and started sketching. Ideas
became a multitude of tape, cardboard
and wood prototypes,” explains Tae Kim,
Alite’s founder.
These rough designs were taken into
CAD (Alite uses Rhino and SolidWorks)
and the resulting models were 3D printed.
Having created two injection mould
tools, it was ready to go into production.
The Clover Cook Set, which is made of
BPA-free, food-safe Nylon 6, comes with
a lifetime guarantee. “Our key initiative
is if we could make the products last a
lifetime that would be more sustainable The three-in-one Clover Cook Set
than making something that would fall includes a big spoon for stirring
apart. We work with our vendors and and a spatula for flipping or for
cutting with its serrated edge. The
manufacturers to figure out the best two can then be joined together to
manufacturing process for that,” says Kim. form tongs. Simply reverse and it
alitedesigns.com nests for easy storage
24 MONTH 200X DEVELOP3D
25 D3D Ads.indd 1 18/02/2015 08:49
 br
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Do Rol Briti
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26 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

rig
PROFILE

ht
ks DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 27
 PROFILE

N
1

ecessity is the mother of Ambitious goal ●

invention. This proverb is
certainly true in the case of
Gilo Cardozo, British aviation
engineer and seasoned
adventurer. In 2007 having
created a paramotor (a foot-
launched powered paraglider)
that could get him to the summit
of Everest, he needed an engine
to power it. Not being able to find anything up to the job, he
set about designing his own four-stroke rotary engine.
Having achieved his Mission Everest goal (see box piece
on page 30), Cardozo decided to set up a rotary engine
manufacturing brand within his paramotor business
Parajet (see develop3d.com/profiles/it-gives-you-wings) called
Rotron Power in 2008, both of which are under the parent
company Gilo Industries Group.
This subsidiary has grown over the years and ironically
no longer supplies Parajet with its engines. Rather, Rotron
manufactures advanced rotary engines for Unmanned
Aeronautical Vehicle (UAV) applications. “Rotron is
our largest business within the group supplying high
power to weight ratio engines for extreme applications,
predominantly within the commercial aerospace sector,”
says Jim Edmondson, CEO of Gilo Industries Group.
1 Rotron’s
purpose-built
Rotron’s aim was to develop a rotary engine that could
engine production
deliver a higher power to weight ratio compared to any other facility encompasses
UAV specific engine while remaining small, lightweight, full design,
reliable and with almost zero vibration. manufacturing and
test capabilities
“We came up with some unique patented ideas. For
instance, the tip ceiling, which used to be a major problem
with rotary engines, has been solved because of new
technologies and materials.
“But the major issue is the heat build up in the centre of
the engine, which is hard to extract. So we developed several
different unique ideas that extract energy from the centre of
the engine allowing the engine to have longevity and more
reliability,” comments Edmondson.
For instance, the Rotron Pressurised Cooling (RPC)
system offers cooling and lubrication to the engine and
means it delivers a higher endurance lifecycle and is less
prone to metal fatigue and component wear compared
with existing rotary engines.
“We have developed this water cooled shaft which means
that water can be funneled through the centre of the shaft
thereby cooling the shaft as it works, which then also has
a cooling effect on the internals of the rotor — but also the
water goes round the external or gap in the housing so it
cools from the outside and the inside and it’s had a massive
effect,” says Charlie Nicol, Rotron’s head of operations.

WHAT IS A rotary engine is

essentially an internal
gasoline engine, which
converts rotary motion
type of engine include
simplicity, smoothness,
and has often been
deemed impractical.
a very low lifespan.
“But in the aviation
A ROTARY combustion engine directly into driving compactness, high “They are plagued with world, as well as other
ENGINE? that can achieve four
strokes — intake,
force, in 1919.
As opposed to the
revolutions per minute
and a high power to
problems because if you
look at the tips of the
applications such
as motorcycles and
compression, common piston engine, weight ratio. rotor, when they spin outboards, what is
combustion and with its pistons all Over the years, round they wear quite important is a very high
exhaust — while changing direction, various companies have quickly,” explains Jim power to weight ratio
rotating. German in a rotary engine all improved on Wankel’s Edmondson, CEO of Gilo where the lifespan of an
engineer Felix Wankel parts rotate, moving engine design, however, Industries Group. “For engine isn’t as important
first had the idea in one direction. it has a number of that reason, people think as the weight impact,”
for this new type of Advantages of this inherent problems that rotary engines have he adds.

28 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

‘‘ What
we have
Work and play
The design and development work of these engines was
carried out by Rotron engineers using predominantly
also done SolidWorks, of which it has ten seats in-house, making use
is work of the tool’s bolt ons including failure mode and effects
out how analysis (FMEA) and computational fluid dynamics (CFD).
But Edmondson stresses that, as important as it is to
to heat the have good tools, the company wants to instil a culture of
fuel up to innovation by ensuring that its employees enjoy being at
98 degrees work. “If you’re making inspiring technology, it should be
Celsius an inspiring place to work as well,” he says.
So, activities that the company organises for all employees
before it includes Boot Camp, a bicycle ‘chain gang’ (a group cycle
is actually ride after work), getting inspiring speakers to give a talk
injected (the most recent being James Holland, a World War Two
into the aviation historian) and a ‘Fly to Work’ programme where
they can get to fly a paramotor.
engine
’’ “If your employees are excited about coming to work on
a Monday morning, then you get the best out of them. It
becomes an exciting environment and that is what it should
be about, not this crazy mathematical problem that you
have to solve using SolidWorks,” comments Edmondson.
Heavy fuel engines
All of this hard work and play has led to Rotron’s most
recent innovation, which it launched at the Farnborough
Air Show 2014 last July — commercial off the shelf (COTS)
2
3 beginning of the rotor, it starts pushing it round, then the
heavy fuel engines in the 20-60 HP engine category. As
a heavy fuel version of its gasoline RT300 (single rotor
engine) and RT600 (twin rotor engine) engines, Rotron
claims to be the only manufacturer in the world producing
a heavy fuel propulsion system within this engine category.
Until now, UAV manufacturers have not been able to
offer heavy fuel engines within the Medium Altitude
Endurance (MALE) UAV market sector. This is largely due
to the extreme power-to-weight ratios required in such
propulsion systems; the size of the engine makes it difficult
to propagate the flame and ignite heavy fuel.
However, the UAV market, especially for use in defence and
military applications, has coveted heavy fuel engines since
NATO’s announcement of the single fuel policy in 1997. This
policy states that one single fuel should be used across all
motorised military assets from chainsaws to UAVs by 2020.
The way in which a diesel engine, or a compression-
ignition engine, works is that it uses the heat of
compression to initiate ignition and burn the fuel that
has been injected into the combustion chamber. But a fair
amount of mass and energy is needed to make that happen
and that is why diesel engines are quite big and so not
suitable for small applications such as UAVs.
“You could use spark ignition, the same as with a petrol
engine, but that has inherent problems because diesel is
so inert that you can take it on a plane in a flask and not be
stopped as you can’t light it with a match or flame. It has to
be heated up to 98 degrees Celsius to even start lighting it,”
says Edmondson.
Leading the way
With the challenge set, this small manufacturer began
work on its heavy fuel engine around three years ago. Its
goal was to lead the race in developing a solution that the
military could use in its UAV applications such as search
and rescue, anti-piracy and pipeline inspection.
The main innovation within the resulting engine is flame
propagation — making the flame burn smoothly across the
whole flank. Essentially, what Rotron has managed to do is
align the spark plugs so that the engine doesn’t have one or
two spark plugs, as in its petrol variant, but four.
“With four spark plugs, as the ignition starts at the
second two fire almost instantaneously after with lighting
the back of the fuel. But what we have also done is work out
— I can’t go into too much detail — how to heat the fuel up
to 98 degrees Celsius before it is actually injected into the
engine,” explains Edmondson.
Rotron engineers relied heavily on computer modelling to
work this out. They weren’t only modelling flame direction,
but also using CFD to calculate property strengths and to
analyse where failures could occur.
This analysis work was carried out in conjunction with
physical trials. So, a part is first designed and analysed in
●
2 The Rotron’s charged cooling combined
with other proprietary cooling systems
delivers a reduced heat signature and
reduced component wear
●
3 Precision engineered single-rotor
eccentric shaft machined from a single billet
●
4 Close up of Rotron’s lightweight cast
rotor housing of an LCR engine
DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 29
 PROFILE

the 3D world before it is built and physically tested. That

information is then correlated back to simulation. 5
Doing it this way means that not nearly as many prototype
rotors were destroyed, as they would have been if no
simulations had been carried out. And with it costing
£1,000 for each prototype built, a great deal of money was
saved in the process too.

Testing, testing
In November 2014, Rotron engineers prepared the RT600
heavy fuel engine for its first application-based test
programme. Having completed a complex installation into
the test mule at its facility, the team performed pre-testing
on all engine components and ancillaries to ensure optimal
configuration setup. Having received very positive first
results, future developmental testing will centre on the new
starter system that is currently being prototyped.
These test results will be supported by data collected
over an extensive pre-flight development program. For
this, Rotron has secured four launch partners who will be
working with the manufacturer to test the engine.
6
One of these is a helicopter manufacturer, which will use
the engines in unmanned helicopters to carry out power
line inspections. “As you can imagine, power lines going
across mountain ranges are very hard to track but these
helicopters can shoot along them and with special cameras
can pick up heat impacts from the transistors.
“With our engines being high power to weight and with
very little vibration they are ideal for such UAVs,” describes
Edmondson.
Although full production of the heavy fuel engines is only
scheduled for 2016, Rotron moved into its own facilities
in May 2014, which is right next door to the factory it used
to share with Parajet. Already some new investments have
been made to the shop floor including a DEA Coordinate
Measuring Machine (CMM) to deliver precise, accurate
manufactured components for the new rotary engines.
To further improve its processes, the design studio is also
in the process of implementing SolidWorks Enterprise
Product Data Management (EPDM), a data management
system that Rotron hopes will get its design data under ROTRON’S In early 2007 Rotron
founder and chief
The supercharger was
modified to be spun at up
control and improve the way it manages and collaborates
on product development.
HISTORY technology officer, Gilo
Cardozo, pursued a
childhood dream: to fly a
to 200,000rpm in order
to simulate sea level
atmospheric pressure of 1
“I think any company that has grown from five people five paramotor 30,000ft over bar at 30,000ft.
the summit of Everest. To eliminate the
years ago to +50 today, needs to have these processes put in Having teamed up with problem of icing, the
place. This tool from SolidWorks should be a huge help to friend and TV personality supercharger was placed
Bear Grylls, Cardozo had before the fuel delivery
us in terms of control and configuration,” says Edmondson. just seven months to build system. The heated and
When full production of the heavy fuel engines begins in two paramotors. supercharged air was
2016, 20 per cent of the engine will be made in-house with However, the most then sent through an
powerful paramotor intercooler before passing
the rest outsourced. But all suppliers will be sourced in engine available was the injector at an average
the UK as Rotron, and its parent company Gilo Industries, barely producing 30hp of 25 degrees Celsius.
passionately believe that design and manufacturing is and was far too heavy After four
to launch at the desired months of design,
critical to the future economic growth of British industry. altitude. So, he also set development, testing
rotronuav.com about building a four- and manufacturing, the
stroke rotary engine that engine was finally ready.
was more compact and With just two days before
●
5 With fewer moving ●
6 The Rotron ●
7 Target Drone
50 per cent lighter than a departure, the second
parts, the Rotron RT600HFE: Engine: suitable for piston engine equivalent. engine was completed.
engine offers easier suitable for UAVs Short-life UAVS & The basis of the Everest On 14 May 2007 the
maintenance requiring 56HP Aerial targets engine was a 294cc single two pilots took off and
rotor engine producing in a flight that lasted
40hp as a standard four hours they achieved
normally aspirated a paramotoring world
engine. record of 29,494 feet.
The engine included On completion of the
a miniature centrifugal expedition and building
supercharger fitted with on its success, Cardozo
a miniature intercooler continued to develop his
to ensure the air was rotary engine and looked
as cold and dense as for a commercial platform
7 possible when entering
the combustion chamber.
for the technology. Rotron
Power was born.

30 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

Adam-Hartles-Gilo-Edition-v1.pdf 1 16/02/2015 17:18:30
 EVENT PREVIEW
dEVElOP3d liVE
2015 PREViEW
» With more exhibitors than ever before and a top drawer conference programme
DEVELOP3D LIVE on 26 March 2015 looks set to be our most exciting event yet
d
EVELOP3D LIVE is a
globally unique product
design conference and
exhibition, featuring talks
from leading designers,
engineers, design tool
developers, hardware manufacturers and
rapid prototyping technologists.
We have brand new products to see, free
training, graphics cards and workstation
competition prizes. The conference
features four tracks of speakers, hand
picked by the DEVELOP3D editorial team,
with multiple exhibition spaces, special
technology break out areas and tours of the
Warwick Manufacturing Group’s (WMG’s)
impressive engineering facilities. The
event is free to attend, we provide lunch and
coffee/tea at regular intervals, and we hope
you enjoy celebrating the best in product
design and engineering.
cONFERENcE: Throughout the year we
meet and visit many innovative designers and
engage with all the key design tool developers.
DEVELOP3D LIVE enables us to bring our
written stories to life for one day. With four
simultaneous tracks, we have 34 speakers
talking on a wide variety of design-related
topics: conceptual, automotive, aerospace,
product, analysis, virtual/augmented reality,
design tools and professional 3D printing.
32 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
PROdUcT dEVElOPMENT TEch:
These are interesting times in the design
software market, with many established
desktop products available we are beginning
to see a number of new generation design
tools come to market, offering innovative
connected modelling tools with collaboration
capabilities. Looking forward, how should
designers prepare for the next generation
of tools? DEVELOP3D LIVE will feature
a major launch of a new CAD system and
presentations on the next generation of tools.
PROdUcT dESiGN & ENGiNEERiNG
This year we have doubled down on product
designers and engineers with two tracks
covering a wide range of specialist areas.
See pages 33 to 46 for the highlights and
check develop3dlive.com for the latest news.
MaKE aNd FaBRicaTiON
The revolution is now. It’s never been so
easy to bring your designs to life and we
have an array of designers and engineers
that want to share their experiences and
workflows with their peers. Expect to hear
some new stuff and get a peek into the
future of desktop manufacture.
STaRT-UP: New for 2015, DEVELOP3D
LIVE features a track dedicated to those
who want to bring their inventions to
market, looking at funding, product
development and finding a route to market.
With talks from those who have managed to
pull it off with those who have helped along
the way.
EXhiBiTiON: On 26 March, Warwick Arts
Centre is going to be full with the most
varied and innovative exhibits. With over 60
stands and many new-to-market products
on show, there’s plenty to touch and see;
3D printers, modelling tools, design
visualisation technology, laser scanners,
document management, simulation tools,
workstations, and the latest in desktop
fabrication. There will also be hands on
training sessions with Autodesk Fusion
and the brand new Onshape Pro from the
original SolidWorks team.
www.develop3dlive.com/exhibitors
WMG
The WMG is on-site at the Warwick
University campus and offers UK firms the
opportunity to carry out research or assist
in solving design and production problems.
Tour places are limited to three groups of
20 in the day, so be sure to book your slot
when you arrive on-site, at registration
accOMMOdaTiON
We realise that many of you travel great
distances to attend the show. With
registration opening at 8:00 am on
Thursday 26 March and the event starting
promptly at 9.00 am, we are pleased to
offer quality affordable bed and breakfast
accommodation on-site on Wednesday 25
March. Cost is £66 inc VAT and includes
a full English breakfast, free Wi-Fi and
parking. Book your room directly at
tinyurl.com/D3D-accom (conference
registration also required — see below).
claiM YOUR FREE TicKET
develop3dlive.com/registration
We look forward to welcoming you to
DEVELOP3D LIVE at Warwick Arts
Centre, CV4 7AL on Thursday 26 March

aNdY claUGhTON America’s Cup winner, Sir Ben Ainslie,
with the long-term aim of challenging for
BEN aiNSliE RaciNG Britain and bringing the America’s Cup
back home to where it all began in 1851.
COURTESY OF LLOYD IMAGES / BEN AINSLIE RACING
having been involved with the competition
since 1983. As Technical Director of Ben
Ainslie Racing, Andy will coordinate a
team of designers and engineers as they

B
en Ainslie Racing (BAR) was Britain’s Andy Claughton is one of design, build and test the prototype and
conceived in 2011 by four times the world’s most accomplished and final boats that will challenge for the 35th
Olympic gold medalist and 34th experienced America’s Cup designers, America’s Cup.

CARL BASS GIAN PAOLO BASSI

AUTODESK CEO SOLIDWORKS CEO

ThE FUTURE OF cad

W
ith embryonic ‘next generation’
modelling tools coming to market
and an increasing number of cloud-
based services and applications, designers
need to understand their implications on
JON HIRSCHTICK modelling, simulation and fabrication. As
CHAIRMAN
ONSHAPE these new products are introduced initially
as ‘companion’ seats, does this mean the
tools we have invested in and completely rely
on will soon be legacy systems?
DEVELOP3D LIVE will bring all the
major CAD tool developers under one roof
to explain how these new capabilities will,
both now and in the future, improve on
the current tools and how we can manage
this transition.
DAN STAPLES BRIAN THOMPSON
With a high-ranking line-up of executives,
SIEMENS PLM VP OF PRODUCT
MANAGEMENT, PTC expect to hear the latest on developments
concerning SolidWorks, PTC Creo,
Autodesk Inventor and Fusion, Siemens
Solid Edge and NX and more. We also
welcome Jon Hirschtick, founder of
SolidWorks, to launch a brand new cloud-
based modeller, Onshape.
 CONFERENCE HIGHLIGHTS Skylon is an unpiloted,
reusable spaceplane
intended to provide reliable,
responsive and cost
effective access to space

Richard Varvill
REACTION ENGINES

R
eaction Engines conducts research
into space propulsion systems,
centred on the development of the
Skylon re-usable SSTO spaceplane, using
its own Sabre engine design.

The company has also developed the A2

passenger plane concept, capable of flying
non stop, halfway around the world at
hypersonic speed (Mach 5+).

Richard Varvill is Technical director and

head designer and is currently responsible
for the technical
aspects of Skylon and
the Sabre engine. He
is one of the founding
directors along with
Alan Bond and John
Scott-Scott.

DOMINIC WILCOX
Artist + inventor +
DESIGNER

D
ominic Wilcox works between the
worlds of art, design, craft and
technology to create innovative and
thought provoking objects.
Recent projects include the design of a
pair of shoes with inbuilt GPS to guide
the wearer home, a Binaudios device
to listen to the sounds of a city, a race
against a 3D printer at the V&A and a
stained glass driverless car of the future.
In 2009 he started a Webby award
nominated blog called Variations on
Normal where he shows his sketchbook
inventions and observations. He has
received commissions from a diverse
range of organisations such as Paul
Smith, Selfridges, The V&A museum,
BMW Mini and Jaffa Cakes.

34 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

 Environment created in Autodesk® Maya® and rendered in Autodesk® VRED™ Professional
RELY ON THE POWER
OF AMD FIREPRO TM

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© Copyright 2015 Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. All rights reserved. AMD, the AMD Arrow logo, FirePro, and combinations thereof are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. OpenCL and the OpenCL logo are
trademarks of Apple Inc. used by permission by Khronos. Other names are for informational purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.
Environment created in Autodesk® Maya® and rendered in Autodesk® VRED™ Professional

MA5832_AMD_d3d_A4_v2_0.indd 1 21/01/2015 12:21

 CONFERENCE HIGHLIGHTS

RML Group

O
ne of the world’s most successful
and innovative motorsport
organisations, DEVELOP3D LIVE
is proud to have Arnaud Martin, Director
of Powertrain at RML (Ray Mallock Ltd)
talk at the conference.
RML Group engages in design,
development, build and operations of
race vehicles, performance road cars,
concept vehicles, advanced engines, EV
and Hybrid powertrain and electronics.

The Nissan ZEOD (Zero Emissions On

Demand) features ground breaking
hybrid powertrain solution including
multi award winning 3 cylinder engine.

A Fantastic lineup
Sarah Giblin
Riut (Revolution
in user thinking)

of SPEAKERS

A
s usual DEVELOP3D LIVE will have
a plethora of designers, engineers
and industry specialists. This year
we have three key areas: Product Design,
Make / Fabricate and Start-up.
We have doubled down on product
Frank Cooper
design with a wide range of innovative Jewellery Industry
Innovation Centre
practitioners telling us their experiences
with technology, fabrication and clients. Mona Hess
3DIMPact
Mark Sanders
Principal of MAS Design
Make/Fabricate is the track for those
interested in rapid prototyping, 3D
printing and taking design from art to
part. We have the guys from MakerCafe,
FBFX, Inition and Granger and Worrall
to name but a few, and also some exciting
exclusives from Autodesk and HP on its
3D printers.
We have two star designers making
a return to the stage: Mark Sanders of
MAS design (Strida folding bike, one
touch can opener) and Mark Shayler of Mark Shayler Hutch Hutchison
Ape, who doesn’t mince his words when Ape Head of Design, Vertu

it comes to eco-design. Chris Cheung

from the Foundry will be on hand to
divulge the latest in conceptual design.
We also have Hutch Hutchison from
Vertu designer phones, Aerialtronics
(drones), and presentations on jewellry
design, scanning and much more.
Check out develop3dlive.com/speakers
for more exciting announcements.
36 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
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 Exhibition HIGHLIGHTS

Design visualisation

A
wide range of specialist design
visualisation and rendering
technologies will be demonstrated
including V-Ray from Chaos Group,
KeyShot from Luxion, iray+ from
Lightworks and HDR Light Studio.
For CAD-integrated design visualisation,
including real time rendering, check out
SolidWorks, Solid Edge, NX, PTC Creo,
Autodesk Fusion, Autodesk Inventor, Scene rendered in
Luxion KeyShot
solidThinking, and more.

Workstation TECH

T
here will be a massive array of
workstation technologies on show
including the latest AMD FirePro
GPUs, which can handle heavy duty
3D graphics and compute tasks on a
single card, plus a whole range of new
workstations based on Intel’s Xeon E5-
2600 v3 series CPUs.
HP will be highlighting its new Z
workstations including the HP ZBook
15u Workstation Ultrabook. Lenovo will
be showing off its shiny new ThinkStation
P Series desktops and ThinkPad mobile
workstations, while Fujitsu and Dell
will present their respective Celsius and
Precision workstation families.
Specialist manufacturer Scan will
demo its overclocked workstations while
3Dconnexion will present its CAD-focused
2D and 3D mice. HP Z640

The Mark One 3D

3D PRINTING printer can reinforce
parts with carbon fibre

D
EVELOP3D LIVE will play host
to its biggest ever range of 3D
printing technologies including
Blueprinter’s low-cost sintering tech,
Formlabs stereolithography machine,
and Markforged’s Mark One, which can
reinforce parts with carbon fibre.
Emco Education will highlight 3D
Systems’ range of printers. CDG will have
live demos of the ProJet 1200 micro-SLA
3D printer and other machines. Laser
Lines and Tri-Tech 3D will both showcase
the full range of Stratasys 3D printers.
Meanwhile, Hobs Studio, Malcolm
Nicholls Limited (MNL), Ogle Models
and Prototypes and Proto Labs will all be
on hand to promote a wide range of 3D
printing and prototyping services.
38 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
CaD/CaM

C
AD software will be in abundance
on the exhibition floor with
demonstrations of leading product
development software including Autodesk
Fusion, Siemens PLM Software NX and
Solid Edge, PTC Creo, and SolidWorks
Industrial Designer.
Onshape, a next generation, cloud-
based CAD tool, founded by the original
SolidWorks team, will also be given
plenty of floor time, as well as EPLAN for
electrical engineering, DriveWorks for
design automation, ITI TranscenData for
CAD data exchange and solidThinking
for industrial design and developing
structurally efficient concepts,
There will also be a wide range of
manufacturing technologies from Delcam,
Vero and Tebis, including tooling design,
reverse engineering, 5-axis machining, SolidWorks
wire EDM and others. Industrial Design

sIMulaTIoN

T
here will be a wide variety of
Finite Element Analysis (FEA),
Computational Fluid Dynamics
software (CFD) and multiphysics
simulation technologies on display.
Ansys, the specialist Computer Aided
Engineering (CAE) software developer
will be showcasing its latest release,
Ansys 16.0, while Autodesk, Siemens
PLM Software, PTC and SolidWorks will
be presenting a wide range of CAD-
integrated simulation technology.
FlowHD will be showing meshless
XFlow CFD technology, Strategic
Simulation & Analysis (SSA), a reseller
for the DS SIMULIA product range, will
be promoting its training and consulting
services, and NAFEMS the independent,
not-for-profit, CAE association, will be on
hand for best practice advice. DS Simulia Abaqus

MoRE ExCITING TECH Faro Focus3D

X330 Laser Scanner

F
or quality inspection and organic
modelling, CDG will have live
product demonstrations of Geomagic
Capture and Geomagic Sculpt.
Delcam’s PowerINSPECT will also be on
show for comparison of parts, prototypes
and tooling against CAD data.
Faro will exhibit its portable Faro Arm
Edge with LLP and Focus3D X330 Laser
Scanner, while Physical Digital will be
promoting its non-contact 3D scanning
technology.
For data management, CSI will be on
hand to discuss DesignDataManager
(DDM), while Kenesto will demo its cloud-
based, collaborative solution.
Mainframe2 will be showing how easy it
is to put CAD in the cloud.
DEVELOP3D.COM DECEMBER / JANUARY 2014 39
 MARCH 2015
SIMULATION W
#7 FEA + TESTING
» FEA can tell us many things, but integrated test and simulation programs
are the only way to effectively develop products, writes Laurence Marks
I
thought I’d round off this series of
articles with a piece on actually
making simulation work in
reality. Too many people think
that simulation techniques are
about pushing an ‘improve my design’
button, but simulation software doesn’t
just radiate goodness like some form of
information age fairy godmother.
So far we’ve looked at various approaches
and techniques, which can be used to
represent what happens to components and
systems when they are used. And for all the
incredible benefits, all these have one huge
shortcoming. They are only as good and
relevant as the input data, assumptions,
guesses and prejudices
which are their very DNA.
In fact it has been said (well
I think it has been said, but
as usual Google has failed
to come up with the goods)
that the only function of a
numerical model is to reinforce
the prejudices of the person
that created it.
We’ll concentrate on finite
element models for a while.
So the first useful thing we
can do is to try and visualise
what an FEA model
actually is. { fig.1} shows in
conceptual terms what an FEA
model is all about.
A continuous body is represented by a
series of spring stiffnesses, and where these
spring stiffnesses connect to each other we
can calculate deflections. These calculation
points are the only places in the model where
we can apply loads and fixings. We calculate
stresses by working out what has happened
to the small sub-regions bounded by the
springs stiffnesses.
The effectiveness of the process is
governed by how well the springs represent
40 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
the structure, how well our assessment of
the restraints represents how the structure
is actually fixed, and how well we’ve
interpreted the loads
If we focus more closely on the springs
we can learn a lot. Robert Hooke, the great
unsung hero of English technology, said that
the deflection of a spring was proportional to
its stiffness and the load applied to it. And at
a time when witches were still being burned
at the stake, that was pretty impressive. But
many of the materials we engineer with
simply don’t obey that law – not that
on-line material databases
acknowledge
that very often. In fact much
of the information is contradictory.
Use one piece of information and you’ll
get one answer, use another piece and you’ll
get a very different one. So you need enough
of a material definition to get a sufficiently
accurate answer, but you don’t want a PhD.
But the 64 million dollar question is “how
do you know that your model is rigorous
enough?” We’ll leave that there for the
moment and move on.
Anyone who read the Bob Johnson series
of articles in DEVELOP3D will be aware
of the importance of decently defined
restraints. He’s evangelical about it, and
for good reason. It’s pretty important. But
again, even if you follow all the best advice
on the subject, how do you know that you’re
constraints nail it?
Hopefully a picture is forming. A finite
element model is built up using a series of
descriptions – geometry, material, loads,
restraint, interfaces, physics etc, etc. And
each one required an understanding,
interpretation or description of what was
happening in the real world – or a lucky
guess at what was going on in the real
world. Obviously some
scenarios are easier to
interpret than others.
But a series of intelligent
guesses at what could be
going on, is, after a good
{ fig.1} deal of number crunching,
transformed into what
are often staggeringly
impressive graphics. In
this respect CFD beats
FEA hands down. And
those graphics are often
pretty convincing, as well
as being just pretty. And
at this stage you either
believe those results to be the single
version of the truth, or you chose the path of
cynicism. Only one makes sense if you think
about the inputs, but you’d be surprised how
tough it is to convince some of our customers
that the results are anything other than 100%
definitive.
So you need some form of stake in the
ground, or reference point, to provide
something to compare the simulation results
to. And that has to be the performance or
behaviour of an actual thing. In the real
world. Measured and quantified. Which
means a good old fashioned test.
The process of making the simulation
model behave like the test is a real learning
experience, and the way in which the
 COMMENT

LAURENCE MARKS

WORKSHOP
‘‘’’
Too many people think that simulation techniques
are about pushing an ‘improve my design’ button, but
simulation software doesn’t just radiate goodness like
some form of information age fairy godmother

engineer and designer learns what really reality, are only that because they have built
makes the thing tick; what and what isn’t on years and years of test data already in the
important. It’s the IP of the design from a vault. We need to accept that, at the moment,
functionality point of view. Not surprising simulation delivers better testing of better
then that the NDA [Non Disclosure products, which we understand more. That
Agreement] is common currency at FEA has to be better than a simple “make it
consultancy companies. better button”.
I’d always thought about rounding off this
Laurence Marks is the managing
series with a piece on the Simulia Living director of Strategic Simulation and
Heart model. This is a seriously advanced Analysis Ltd, a company supplying the
model, which needs the power of both Simulia range of simulation software,
training, implementation as well as
Abaqus and a multiprocessor machine to consultancy services to a wide range
run. But the point is that for all its impressive of industries. ssanalysis.co.uk
behaviour the model only makes sense in the
context of a team of engineers and medics
working together.
Anyone who has ever worked in a team
which is made up of doctors and engineers
will appreciate that critical review and a focus
on delivering useful data is never far from
the top of the medical agenda. Doctors, in { fig.1} In conceptual
terms what an FEA model
my experience, seem largely immune to the is all about: a continuous
blinding effects of high-level graphics. body is represented
About 10 years ago I had an idea, which by a series of spring
stiffnesses, and where
I am now, depressingly, seeing being these spring stiffnesses
presented at conferences. Rapid prototyping connect to each other we
is revolutionising small batch production of can calculate deflections
parts. So why can’t RP techniques be used to { fig.2} Simulia Living
Heart model: for
accelerate product design by accelerating the
all its impressive
progress around the simulation test loop? behaviour the
Surely this is a critical way ahead – there are model only makes
many, many issues which need to be solved, sense in the
context of a team
but I’m pretty sure they can be, with the net of engineers and
result that product development cycles can be medics working
further reduced. together
So what’s my elevator pitch here? Simply
that simulation only makes sense in a world
where there is, or has been, sufficient testing.
Perhaps in some silver suited future, where
we can model every atom and molecule of
a structure, we won’t need testing, but now
integrated test and simulation programs
are the only way to develop products. And
before anybody else does I’ll mention the
no test programs, which, where they are a { fig.2}

DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 41

 PROFILE
SMOOTH RIDE
» Champion Motorsport is putting its track prowess into road-going Porsches,
using 3D printing to smooth the airflow within its carbon fibre parts
T
urning a legacy of
track victories into
successful road
going business is
historically the way to
motoring success. From Ferrari
to McLaren, it’s a well-worn route
that has served many well.
Champion Motorsport’s racing
legacy includes a win at the 24
Hours of Le Mans and five straight
American Le Mans Series LMP1
championships: two as a private
team and three as an Audi Sport
North America factory team.
With the trophy cabinet suitably
stocked, the team is now using its
racetrack knowledge to develop
and manufacture aftermarket
performance upgrade parts for
sports cars.
Producing the likes of exhausts,
wheels and turbochargers,
boosting power levels and
shaving off weight, the parts
increase the car’s abilities.
An example is Champion’s
carbon fibre turbo inlet duct for
the Porsche 997 Turbo.
By constructing the duct from
carbon fibre, Champion was able
to increase the duct’s interior
dimensions while keeping
42 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
1 2
3 4
the outer diameter at factory halves, the disadvantage of
specifications. The result is better this being that the two halves
airflow through the duct, leading must be bonded together after
to improved engine performance. moulding, resulting in a part not
The new design is also lighter as strong as one with single-piece
than the original part, which construction.
further enhances performance. In both cases, a good surface
“Producing complex tubular finish is only obtained on one
composite components, such side of the part.
as the turbo inlet duct, is very Over time, Champion tried
challenging,” says Chris Lyew, different methods for producing
lead mechanical engineer, inlet ducts but was unable to
Champion Motorsport. attain a seam-free part with high
“The performance of the vehicle quality surface finish on both the
depends on a smooth internal outer and inner surfaces.
surface while the customer expects Already using a Fortus 3D
a beautiful external surface. The printer to make conceptual and
part also needs to be very strong to functional FDM prototypes during
last the life of the vehicle.” the design process, the idea struck
Achieving a smooth interior to try using it to make soluble
and exterior surface finish with cores for moulds. After some
tubular composite components is tests, they perfected the technique;
almost impossible using ●
1 Porsche 997 making its ducts in a
conventional tooling. Turbo with FDM- single piece by laying up
If the part is moulded in enabled components carbon fibre on an FDM
a single piece, the interior ● 2 FDM soluble core-
printed soluble core.
enabled components
core can be trapped inside on an engine An excellent external
the tube, unless it is made ● 3 Composite turbo surface finish was
of a material that can later inlet duct (black) achieved by combining
be washed away like a made with FDM the soluble core with an
soluble core (white)
sacrificial sand core. external clamshell mould,
An alternative is to ●
4 Complex composite
ducts made from while the core can be
mould the tube in two FDM soluble cores easily dissolved away in
a solution bath after the carbon
fibre resin was cured.
This solution for the turbo inlet
ducts has also been transferred
to a number of other tubes and
pipes for the Porsche engine
— not only improving the
performance of the part, but the
production speed by providing a
reliable automated process.
“We substantially improved the
quality of our carbon fibre turbo
inlet ducts and other aftermarket
parts by making them with FDM
soluble cores,” says Lyew. “It’s
now possible to mould the inlet
duct in a single piece that is much
stronger than parts produced by
bonding.
“Every FDM soluble core is
exactly the same so it’s easy to
maintain the internal finish of
the duct as well.”
By using 3D printing to produce
the soluble cores, Champion
has also opened up a new
world of design possibilities,
knocking away the barriers that
have traditionally got in the way
of improving its design and
manufacturing capabilities.
stratasys.com
championmotorsport.com
 UK- half-A4-VC at the heart_2015 CMS Trimming DVD3d ONLY.pdf 1 16/02/2015 15:44:38

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 PROFILE

HELPING THE
BLUEBIRD
SAIL AGAIN
» The world water speed record breaking craft of Donald Campbell
is being resurrected, with MKW using 5-axis machining to produce
key components with the aid of HyperMILL

2 3

4 5

44 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM


With high material costs and the overall value
of components after machining exceeding
£25,000, getting the job ‘right first time’ takes
on a new level of importance
1
O
n 4 January 1967 Donald sit on the underside of the Bluebird’s sponsons.
Campbell took his Bluebird K7 At nearly 4m long, sponsons are the floating
to the water for the last time. wings on each side of the craft; that during
A turbo jet engine hydroplane, the final journey at 305mph were identified to
the craft allowed Campbell to be continually bouncing off the water.
set seven world water speed records during Unfortunately when the sponsons bounced
the later half of the 1950s and the 1960s. past the maximum 5.5 degree pitch angle the
Its design and engineering was pioneering boat left the water resulting in the fatal crash.
when launched in January 1955, adding MKW more commonly works with clients
nearly 100mph to the existing record, taking it in the defence, aerospace and oil and gas
to 276mph in 1964. industry, to produce complex components on
His quest to break the 300mph speed record its seven 5-axis machines.
on the Cumbrian lake of Coniston took place With the capacity to machine jobs up to six
in order to drum up interest and funding metres long by two and a half metres wide,
for another attempt to better the land speed the majority of work at MKW is aluminium,
record he had held several times. stainless steels, duplex and titanium.
One of the all time great thrillseekers, With high material costs and the overall
Campbell pushed the boat, designed with value of components after machining
speeds around 250mph in mind, to its limit. exceeding £25,000, getting the job ‘right first
Out on the water the attempt ended in time’ takes on a new level of importance.
disaster, the K7 flipping dramatically and Having invested over six million pounds in
tragically killing Britain’s most notorious new hardware, the company felt it needed to
speed record breaker. upgrade its CAM package to ensure they could
Five years after the original craft was raised manage complex toolpaths needed across the
from the lakebed, a team of engineers ● 1 BlueBird K7 company’s twenty six CNC machines.
and enthusiasts decided to rebuild it, replica with MKW adopted Open Mind’s
enlisting the charitable support from sponsons HyperMILL, and with the new
companies in the North East. ● 2 Mazak Turning
machines installed found new
Centre producing oil
The full Bluebird K7 craft is & gas parts at MKW benefits, as programming times were
being re-built around the original ●3 Typical satellite slashed in half, and machining times
construction, although with many of jig manufactured being 30 per cent faster.
the components no longer available at MKW As well as physical gains, the ability
the project is a painstaking process. ●
4 Programming of
to simulate part production before
Bluebird sponson on
Tyneside-based tooling company right hand screen physical cutting, and post-processors
MKW Group provided its expertise to ● 5 Typical oil & gas for each individual machine, provided
manufacture critical components that component at MKW the confidence that the parts would


emerge from the CNC machines as predicted.
Other benefits for MKW are the time saving
features for the programmer, such as the
one that lets them choose a feature on a part
such as a hole, and the software automatically
identifies all other holes with the parameters
and calculates the tool paths accordingly to
eliminate unnecessary tool changes.
This feature recognition has proved of major
benefit on the sponsons manufactured for
the Bluebird K7 project. Each of the two 1.8m
long aluminium sponson parts has over 480
holes of differing diameters and HyperMILL
reduces the tool changeovers and optimises
tool paths with its feature recognition cycle.
MKW also acquired the HyperMAXX
roughing module, which helps avoid full
cutting, sharp corners and edges in the
path, thereby preventing abrupt changes in
direction that drastically reduce the federate.
The Bluebird K7 project was the first to
have the roughing module applied to it,
and despite the sponson parts primarily
consisting of holes and slots, the application
of HyperMAXX shaved 20 per cent off the
four hour machining cycle time for each part.
The sponsons are now attached to the rest
of the craft, although it is still to be fully
completed by the engineering team.
Upon its eventual completion in an
estimated two years, the Bluebird K7 will sail
on Lake Coniston and then be the centrepiece
of a purpose built museum on the lakeside,
a monument to pioneering engineering and
the man that pushed it to the limit.
openmind-tech.com | bluebirdproject.com/K7
DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 45
REVIEWS
Roland MonoFab
» Named after the Japanese concept of monozukuri (meaning: art, science and craft
of making things), Roland’s MonoFab combines 3D printing with CNC machining in two
matched devices. Al Dean puts Roland’s latest offering through its paces

ROLAND ARM-
10 3D PRINTER
TECH-SPECS
» Stereolithography
(SL) build process
using DLP projection
» 130 x 70 x 70 mm
build envelope
» 430 x 365 x 450mm
machine dimensions
» 10mm per hour
build speed
» 17kg
» 0.01mm+ layers
» UV curable resins
» Post processing and
finishing kit included
» 1 year on site
(guaranteed
telephone response
time and engineer
visit times) — 1
extensions available
at @ £734 per

I
» 8kg
doubt that there’s anyone that
» Price €4,999 + VAT
really needs an introduction to
(inc. machine, finishing
kit, resin tray + 350g Roland and its range of hardware
of resin) that supports design and
engineering. If you’ve been through the
UK’s design and engineering education
system, then the chances are that you’ll
ROLAND SRM- have come across its machines at some
20 CNC MILL point.
TECH-SPECS Roland’s history is, of course, in the
wide format printing game, which led
» 3 axis CNC machine the company to start to experiment with
» 6mm cutter collect using the same technology to cut material,
» 203 x 152 x 60.5mm rather than just to print on sheets.
build volume Since then, the company has been, albeit
» 451 x 426 x 426mm quietly, providing 100,000s of units that
machine dimensions cover a range of capabilities. From CNC
» 2kg workpiece mills of varying sizes to laser scanning
weight
devices, and sometimes both combined
» Cutting speed 6 to into a single unit.
1,800mm/min stepper
motor With this success, it was perhaps
» Resolution —
perplexing that the company had, until
0.01mm (using RML-1) recently, avoided the 3D printing game.
or 0.001mm (using After all, if you have that amount of
NC code) customers, that amount of knowledge in
» 1 year return to base numerically controlled machines and that
warranty with £349
reputation, then it would make sense.
per year extension
option
» 19.6kg Enter the MONOFAB
Despite this, it came as a surprise in
» Price £2,799 + VAT
the middle of 2014 when Roland finally
launched its first 3D printing device. What
was interesting was that it didn’t just
release a 3D printer, but rather a brace of
devices — the MonoFab products. This is
comprised of two machines. The first, the
ARM-10, is a Digital Light Processing (DLP)
stereolithography 3D printer.
For those that are unfamiliar with this
technology, it uses a small DLP chip from
Texas Instruments. These are commonly
found in today’s projectors and are
compromised of a matrix of very small
scale reflectors (up to 8 million of them)
and a light source. These mirrors work to
represent pixels on a screen.
In consumer units, visible light is used to
display whatever you’re trying to project
on a surface. In this case, the light source
is UV light and this cures layers of resin
held between a print tray and a build
platform.
Interestingly, while the term UV curable
resin is commonplace, the pedants out
there will know that most machines of this
class use violet light (rather than ultra
violet) in the 405nm wavelength band. But
we’ll get onto the specifics of how it works
shortly.
Alongside the ARM-10, the MonoFab
range also includes a matched CNC
machine. This takes Roland’s mastery of
the desktop CNC game and packages it up
into a nice little unit that matches the 3D
printer in terms of both size and styling.
So, in this review we’ll look at the two
machines separately, then wrap things
up at the end to see what you get for
your money and where it can fit into your
workflow.
THE ARM-10 3D PRINTER
As we’ve discussed, the ARM-10 uses
DLP driven stereolithography. Similarly
to many other machines in its class, this
builds from the bottom up. The projection
unit is in the base of the unit and projects
the light up, through a transparent build
tray to solidify a layer of material onto
the build platform, which gradually
increments up in the Z axis.
As a unit, it’s clear that you’re dealing
with the build quality that you’d expect
from Roland. Getting the thing out of the
box is painless and it’s about ready to go
as soon as you’ve done it.
About the size of an office desktop laser
printer, it looks pretty slick. The orange
is, of course, predominant as it’s required
to block out any stray light that would
otherwise cure the resin in the tray before
you’ve even printed anything.
In terms of initial set-up, Roland has
an interesting set of software and online
support tools. All of the drivers can be
downloaded by logging into its support
tool. This lets you then download the
software needed to set-up your print jobs.
While we had a few glitches, these were
quickly resolved and we were up and
running in about 20 minutes.
The machine connects using a standard
USB cable and the usual power adapter.
It’s worth noting at this point that before
you start printing, you need to ensure that
the workstation you have it plugged into
has the correct power settings.
Essentially, the ARM-10 runs as a
secondary monitor. Because of this, you
need to ensure that any power savings or
monitor shut off settings are turned off in

46 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

 HARDWARE REVIEW

your power settings. It’ll also only run on a

Windows box.
Once done, you’re about ready to get
set-up for your first print.
There are three key things to do before
you start printing. The first is to install the
build tray. You’ll notice that despite the
build envelope of 130x70x70mm, the resin
tray is in fact 130x130mm. We’ll get onto
why that’s interesting later.
You loosen off the finger clamps, slide
in the resin tray then lock it down again.
Interestingly, the machine includes a
protective shutter that only disengages
when you’ve installed the resin tray.
This will save that resin getting into the
projection gubbins and save you a lot
of grief (other machine manufacturers
should take note of this). You then add in 2
the resin from the supplied bottles. There
are handy marks on the side of the build
tray to make sure you don’t over fill it. platform on screen and you can then Once your parts are arranged, you then ●
1 (Previous page)

The final step is to calibrate the build
platform. You do this by loosening four
bolts with an Allen key, hit Calibrate in the
software and it’ll move into position. You
then need to push the print head down
into tray so that it’s flush with the bottom
of the tray.
Now tighten up those bolts. Once done,
you’re ready to rock and roll and get your
first print underway and, as ever, you need
to jump into the supplied software to do it.
SET-up software
Roland has always had interesting
software and the supplied software with
the ARM-10 is equally as interesting. It
steps through the workflow, beginning
with import and healing of the STL
data. It’ll place your parts into the build
adjust and position them, add supports
and define the print parameters.
Now, it’s here that there are some
curiousities. The software doesn’t give
you any automated tools to assist with the
correct orientation of your parts. In some
respects, this is good for those looking
to experiment and that have a working
knowledge of how these machines work.
However, if you don’t, or you just want to
get it working, you’re probably stumped.
The reason for this is that these machines
have some peculiarities centred on how
you need to orient the parts. Typically,
you need to have them at 45 degrees to
the horizontal to avoid building heavy
cross sections. It’s pretty trivial to do this
manually, but some automation would be
useful right at this point.
add in the supports for the parts. Roland’s The Roland MonoFab
support structures (compared to other machines — two
manufacturing or
SLA system software) appear heavy. And
prototyping methods
yes, they do use more materials, but the in a matched pair of
results that we got with the machine devices
indicated that heavier supports mean that ●
2 The Roland ARM-
you’re less likely to have a failed build 10’s build method. UV
— and in the professional space, that’s light is projected from
essential. beneath, through the
build tray to solidify
You then define the build parameters for the model onto the
the print job. The ARM-10 is supplied with build platform above
just a single material. It’s a standard clear
resin as you can see in the above image.
What’s interesting is that Roland has
exposed all of the settings for the process
so while you can dive in and build parts,
you can also experiment with other resins
from the burgeoning market for such
materials.

workflow: SET-up AND BUILD WITH ROLAND’S ARM-10 SLA 3D PRINTER

●
1 The starting point is to import, scale (if needs be), heal
and then orient your parts. Roland's software doesn't have
automatic orientation tools, so you need to work the best
approach manually. Then generate the supports
●
2 The ARM-10 builds using a bottom up, DLP approach.
You need to position the resin tray, add your material, then
calibrate the print platform — done by lowering the build
platform, then manually adjusting it to be flush with the tray
●3 Once ready, you start the print process. The system
them repeats the same process. The platform lowers into
the build platform, exposes a layer’s form, retracts, then
lowers. Over and over again till the part is complete

●
4 Removing the build is simply a case of undoing a single
large knob and removing the platform from the machine.
It’s worth noting that the machine will retract the build
platform and notify you on screen when it’s ready
●
5 The supplied finishing kit gives you everything you need
except rubber gloves and isopropyl alchohol (IPA) for cleaning
up the part. You use the scrap to remove the parts safely and
cleanly then rinse in the IPA to remove any residual resin
●
6 Once rinsed and dried, you can then use the supplied
tools to remove the parts from the support structure and
start to clean them up ready for use. Any post curing is also
advisable at this stage

DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 47

48 D3D Ads.indd 1 18/02/2015 09:11
 HARDWARE REVIEW

over your layer thickness, but it’s quoted

●3 The SRM-20’s When it’s ready, you hit go. The machine
build plate is usefully then sends the layer data to the machine
large and lets you
and starts to build. It runs very quietly as
rip through softer
materials. It won’t do the whole unit is pretty solid. There’s very
metals, but almost little in the way of sheet metal (a problem
anything else is with the cheaper end of the spectrum
possible. It’s just a machines in this class) and because of the
shame it doesn’t come build process, there are very few moving
with t-slots for better
workpiece holding parts, apart from the Z axis control for the
build platform.
RESULTS
Once the build has completed, you’ll find
a message on your workstation and see
your build platform up in the air inside
the machine. To remove, it’s simply a case
of flipping up the lid, undoing the large
thumb wheel and removing the build
platform (don’t forget to remove the lid
when that’s done).
The ARM-10 is supplied with a nice
finishing set-up. There’s an injection
moulded breakout tray with a pocket to
fit the build platform into. You then lever
3 of the same tray.
the part off with the supplied scraper,
and pop into a tub of isopropyl alcohol.
Give it a swirl around, then move the part
to the second tub for a further rinse. It’s
tempting to remove the supports, but let
the part rinse and get all the excess resin
off before you start clean up.
Next steps are that you can dive in and
break out your part (Roland’s supports
break away nicely, even if they are a little
heavy). You’re supplied with a pair of flat
bladed snips, but I’m sure you’ve all got
your own personal set of tools for cleaning
up 3D prints.
Once done, the parts need a bit more
curing. We discussed the use of a UV
sterliser in our FormLabs Form 1+review
back in October 2014 and the same stands
here. If you don’t want to go that route,
then a period in the sun will do the trick,
just more slowly.
The resultant parts from the ARM-10 are
just as you’d expect. The models are clean,
crisp and precise. You have full control
as running as fine as 0.01mm. Build times
will, of course, increase at that level, but a
balance can be struck between build time
and resolution as you see fit.
One thing we briefly mentioned was the
double size build tray. This is a curiousity
in this machine. While the build platform
(in terms of horizontal size) is 130x70, the
resin tray is in fact 130x130mm.
Why is that the case? I’m not entirely
sure, but what it does mean is that when
the PDMS layer on the resin tray starts to
cloud through exposure to the UV light,
which is inevitable on all similar machines,
you can take it out and rotate it 180
degrees and get another set of builds out
As I mentioned, I’m not too sure why
Roland has done it. A full build platform
might have been more useful and would
give similar build capability as the Form
1+. It certainly gives you a little extra bang
for the buck on consumable items.
THE ROLAND SRM-20 CNC MILL
Alongside the 3D printer, the other half of
this rather impressive duo is the SRM-20.
This, as you’d expect from Roland, is a
smaller scale 3 axis CNC machine.
The unit is a lot heavier than the 3D
printer, but packed into a similarly sized
package. Again, the device is set-up and
installed using Roland’s support software.
Whereas the ARM-10 uses a single
application for set-up, with the SRM-20,
you have a number of different options.
The majority of work will be done
through Roland’s ever present Modela
Player application. This gives a backed
in set of tools that allows you to import
part geometry, arrange it and then
program the tool-paths you need to cut
the material.

WORKFLOW: USING THE ROLAND SRM-20 WITH AUTODESK FUSION 360 CAM

●1 Fusion allows CAM toolpaths to be programmed in ●2 Once you've switched to CAM mode, you begin by defining ●3 To create your first operation, put some work into
context, but if you’re looking to machine more than one per a set-up to represent your stock and datum alignment and defining your tooling in the tool library, so they can be
assembly, create a copy position reused — it’s worth including a model of the cutter holder

●4 Next step is to start to define the operations. HSM works ●

5 Once you've created and simulated your operations, you ●
6 Once you’re happy with your operations and have
includes adaptive roughing and clearing and these are a then need to post process. Handily, Fusion includes a Roland exported them using the appropriate post processor, you
good place to begin as they’ll remove material quickly post processor so will spit out the G-code you need can load them into Roland’s vPanel and get cutting

DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 49

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The whole thing is geared up for the prototyping
process, supports the use of tabs (to retain
components) and even steps into double sided cutting.
Alongside this, there are also a few other
applications, that range from tools for designing
engraved forms from scratch to ClickMill, which lets
you quickly define a toolpath and have it cut on the
machine — ideal for facing off or trimming blank
material.
Another key component in the software stack is
the Controller application. This works just like your
Siemens or Heidenhain hardware controllers and is the
point where you load the G-code, set-up datums and
origins as well as have full real time manual control
over spindle and feed rates.
The latter is essential when you’re fine tuning the
best parameters for your cutters, the material and
the machine. Ease the feed-rate off as you start, then
ramp things up once confident you’re not going to
rip the machine apart at its, albeit well constructed,
seams.
What’s also interesting is that while the Roland
software tends to use its own proprietary RML-1
language, it’s also perfectly capable of running
‘standard’ G-code. This means that, given an
appropriate post processor, you can use pretty much
any CAM software you want or have access to.
We did some trials with Autodesk’s Fusion 360 CAM
tools (see workflow on page 49). After a little bit of
tinkering with origins and ensuring they matched up in
both the CAM system and in the controller software, it
worked a treat. The benefit we found was that you end
up with much more intelligence and efficiency in your
toolpaths (meaning quicker cycles), and have more
control over collision checking (assuming you have put
the work into the tooling libraries).
stock set-up
Once you have your tool-paths ready, you then need
to set-up the machine. This, of course, is a two step
process — the material on the table and the cutter in
the chuck.
The SRM-20 features a pretty good sized table and
you have a number of options for fixing your material
to it. The machine comes with double sided adhesive
tape and this works for most materials, assuming that
you’re not running it too hard. I’m sure someone will
adapt the steel table (which fixes in place with four
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thumbscrews) to have a low-profile vice — and if they
don’t, they should.
If you’re looking to get into double or multi-sided
cutting, then the device is also supplied with small
pins that, with some tricks detailed in the manual (in
fact, the subject has its own PDF manual), allow you
to locate and subsequently flip the workpiece into the
same position.
Next up, it’s cutter time. The SRM-20 uses a 6mm
collet chuck that’s removable with a supplied spanner.
If you want to run smaller cutters, then there are also
3, 4, 5 and 3.175mm collets available for £40 a piece.
Into this collet, you insert the cutter, set the depth
and tighten up with a small grub screw (and yes, they
supply a couple of spares thankfully). You then screw
that into the spindle and nip up tight with a spanner.
Here, it’s worth noting that there are two possible
positions for the spindle. One gives you full height,
but the other lets you drop the spindle (and hence the
cutter) if you want to run things more tightly.
It would be nice if you could acquire spare collets
to hold your eventual range of cutters, to save on
removing the whole shebang, setting the length and
such.
First cut is the deepest
When that’s all done, you need to set the datum/
origins for the toolpaths you want to run. This is done
in the controller software and by moving the spindle
to the correct X and Y positions, then also setting the Z
origin separately.
You then load in the G-code (you can batch load
these, assuming you’re running multiples with the
same cutter) and set the machine running. Again,
just as with the ARM-10, you need to ensure that your
workstation is running without those pesky power
saving options — as it’s streaming in the G-code as it
cuts.
The cutting speeds and feeds are completely
dependent on the material you’re working with and
your cutter.
You’ll also need to bear in mind step down when
you’re working with hard materials. With foam and
softer materials, you can really let this thing rip and
you can see your part emerging from the swarf and
dust as it removes material.
Once your first set of tool-paths is complete, it’s
then time to switch your cutter. You need to go
HARDWARE REVIEW
MONOFAB
SHOPPING LIST
UV tool steriliser (~£40): As we
discovered in previous tests, a UV tool
steriliser, as used in beauty salons, is
an excellent option for post curing your
models quickly.
Ultrasonic Parts Washer (~£80): We
discovered this one recently. A small
scale ultrasonic parts washer, filled with
70/30 IPA/Water gives your parts a good
clean and helps with curing.
405nm laser pointer(~£6): Whether
you’re joining larger builds or fixing
parts in place, a decent method is to
use a UV laser pointer to cure a little
resin to solidify facts from support break
away.
Isoprophyl Alcohol (~£5 per litre):
Used to dissolve any excess resin.
Get hold of 5 litres as a start. Keep it
clean and you’ll get nice clean prints as
a result.
Microfibre cloths: These are essential
for cleaning the base of the resin tray to
keep your builds nice and crisp.
Non-powdered gloves: Get them, wear
them.
Henry the Vacuum Cleaner (~ £99):
He’s cheerful, he’s reliable and he’s got
a face on him. He’ll also work unlike the
dust buster type product we initially
used.
DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 51
 HARDWARE REVIEW

through the same set-up process. Assuming that
you’re running with the same origins, it’s essential
that you get the cutter lengths correct.
CONCLUSION
It’s hard to find fault with this pair of Roland
machines. They’re built like tanks, they’re reliable
and they work perfectly once you’ve, as with all
machines, learned the ins and outs of the process.
With the ARM-10 3D printer, this is always down
to ensuring that you’ve got adequate support for
your parts — the rest is pretty reliable. With the
SRM-20 CNC, it’s down to good tool-paths and
matching your cutting settings with the material.
Once done, both will give you good results.
If I had criticisms of both, it would be the simple
fact that they need to be attached to a computer
that’s permanently on while the machines are
running. In the case of the SRM-20 CNC this is
understandable — as you’d need to have control
over the machine while it’s running at first. That
said, once you’ve got the hang of things, it’d be
nice to be able to disconnect and have it running
on its own.
On the 3D printing front, it really is odd that this
isn’t possible, particularly when you consider that
the system is essentially flashing a series of PNG
or similar files through a projector. That said, the
computing requirements aren’t too heavy, so an
older standard PC should do the trick for both.
In terms of costs, we’re looking at around £7,998
for both. As you’d expect, that’s comparable
to buying similar devices separately. In terms
of costs, on the 3D print side, you’re looking at
resins and built trays. They come in at £64.99
for 350g of the resin and £99 for the resin trays
(remember, you get two bites at that particular
cherry by flipping it around).
On the CNC side, you’re looking at materials
(which can vary) and, of course, cutters. The
machine is supplied with a 3mm ball nose, but
you’ll soon find your collection growing.
The spindle unit, while rated for 1,000 hours,
will eventually need replacing. The Spindle motor
is rated for 2,000 hours, so you’ll need to plan
on one spindle unit and one spindle motor (which
includes the spindle unit) every 2,000 hour of
cutting and they come in at around £270 for the
lot.
We’ve also included a handy shopping list on
page 51 to give you an idea of costs and ancillaries
that might be useful.
Ultimately, it seems strange to look at two very
different production methods in one review —
after all, you wouldn’t want the machines running
alongside each other. Seriously, the dust, while
contained in the SRM-20, is a pain to clean out and
you don’t want that anywhere near the 3D printer.
But when you consider the nature of many design
offices’ prototyping requirements, it makes
perfect sense. Many are currently debating 3D
print vs. CNC.
What if you could have both, running off one
machine in the corner of your office. Considering
that you’re looking at two key prototype
production methods, which vary greatly, but cover
all those bases, for just a shade under £8,000,
they represent a solid investment.
rolanddg.co.uk

DESKTOP FACTORY: WHAT’S OUT THERE AND WHAT’S COMING?

Machine: Form1+ Machine: ProJet 1200 Machine: XFAB Machine: Autodesk

Supplier: FormLabs Supplier: 3D Systems Supplier: DWS Systems Supplier: Ember
Price: $3,299 Price: $4,900 Price: Around $5,000 Price: $5,995

Funded through Kickstarter, but heavily VC
backed, FormLabs reignited the interest
in stereolithography. When we looked at
the Form 1+, we came away impressed by
the build results, the reliability and the
affordability. Expect this company to do
very interesting things in the coming years
— killer machine and killer usability with a
decent sized build platform. Exactly what a
design office needs.
■ formlabs.com
Considering it invented the
stereolithography process, 3D Systems
has been slow to release a lower cost
unit. The ProJet 1200 is a compact unit,
built initially for the jewellery and small
intricate component markets, where
investment casting is common. New
materials options have also opened up its
use potential. Let’s hope we see more from
3D Systems in this vein.
■ 3Dsystems.com
DWS or Digital Wax Systems has made
a name for itself by building ultra high
resolution machines for specialised
industries, from jewellery to medical,
wherever resolution is key. Its master of
materials also shows in the forthcoming
XFAB machine, aimed at the desktop
market. Working area will be
180×180mm and the results look
impeccable.
■ dwslab.com
Based on a DLP projection build process,
Autodesk’s Ember printer is at the beta
test stage as units roll out to users that
have paid up in advance. Featuring 25
micron build layers and a fast build
process, it’s looking good for Autodesk’s
first foray into 3D printing hardware.
DEVELOP3D has an early build unit and will
be reporting in the coming months on how
things are progressing
■ spark.autodesk.com/ember

Machine: OtherMill Machine: Carvey Machine: ShopBot Desktop Machine: Muncaster S6

Supplier: OtherMachine Co. Supplier: Inventables Supplier: Shopbot Supplier: Muncaster Technologies
Price: $2,199 Price: $1,999 Price: $5,799 Price: To be confirmed

Funded through Kickstarter, Other
Machine Co’s OtherMill is a small scale CNC
machine (140 x 114 x 31mm). It’s controlled
using cloud-based programming (powered
by Autodesk’s HSMworks code) and will
handle a variety of materials including
some non-ferrous metals (they’re aiming
it at prototyping PCB boards). Priced at
$2,199, it’s a small, portable machine that
might just fit your workflow.
■ othermachine.co
With the experience Inventables has
gained from its ShapeOko machines, the
company has launched the Carvey on
Kickstarter. It gained a lot of exposure
— like that typically associated with a 3D
printer. With a larger build volume (300
x 200 x 70mm), its styling was done by
Minimal, though how it’ll look covered
in model board dust is another matter.
Pricing again around the $1,999 mark.
■ inventables.com
Favourites of the larger MakerSpace or
hackerSpace, Shopbot has built a name
for itself as a provider of larger format
CNC routers over the last few years.
The smallest product in its range is the
ShopBot Desktop. Offering a 610 x 460 x
89mm build volume, it’s a smaller form
factor machine that could be useful in the
prototyping process.
■shopbottools.com
While the other machines are definitely
at the desktop, Muncaster technology
is a new entrant into the market aiming
between the desktop machines and
entry level, full scale, CNC machines. Its
products can be placed in the office or
workshop environment with some serious
machining capability, including automatic
tool changers, 5 axis options. It’s launching
at DEVELOP3D Live 2015 too!
■ muncastertechnologies.com

52 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

Design Faster, Smarter, and Lighter

Design lightweight in, instead of engineering mass out.

Inspire helps design engineers create parts right the
first time reducing costs, development time, material
consumption, and product weight.

 Request a free trial at solidThinking.com/D3D

An Company
 develop3d-2015-02-12-renda-microsoft.pdf 1 13/02/2015 14:56:36

Overclockers Ad.indd 1 18/02/2015 09:16


Novatech E5-1620V3
» With its Xeon CPU, ECC RAM and flexible storage this CAD-
class desktop also shows potential for CAE, writes Greg Corke
P
» Intel Xeon E5- ortsmouth-based Novatech
1620V3 (3.5GHz up to makes its DEVELOP3D
3.6GHz) (Quad Core) debut with a mainstream,
processor
CAD-focused quad core
» 16GB (2 x 8GB) workstation. But rather than
Samsung 2,133MHz
DDR4 ECC memory using a popular Core i7 chip, the Novatech
E5-1620V3 Workstation is based on the
» 120GB Intel 520
SSD + 3TB Seagate Xeon CPU of the same name.
Barracuda HDD Intel Xeon means Error Correcting
» Nvidia Quadro Code (ECC) memory as standard, which,
K4200 (4GB GDDR5) on paper, means fewer crashes. While
GPU (341.21 driver)
we’ve never had any problems running
» Supermicro X10SRI-F CAD on Core i7 workstations, Intel
motherboard
certainly considers ECC to be essential for
» Microsoft Windows 7
Professional 64-bit
professional workstations. If you carry
out complex FEA or CFD studies that take
» 490mm (H) x 200mm
(W) x 493mm (D) hours, even days, ECC memory can help
» One year return
reduce the chance of losing data half way
to base warranty through and having to start again.
included. For 3 years That’s not to say our test machine is really
add £80 and 3 years geared up for simulation. With four CPU
on site add £321. More
options available
cores running at 3.5GHz, a Quadro K4200
GPU for graphics and 16GB of DDR4 ECC
memory, this mid-sized workstation has
£1,654 + VAT
mainstream CAD written all over it — and
novatech.co.uk
this is backed up by solid scores in our
» CPU benchmarks Creo, SolidWorks and single run PowerMill
(secs - smaller is better) benchmarks. However, with the option of
CAM (Delcam PowerMill) 6, 8, 10 or 14 core Xeon CPUs and up to
1) 164 2) 246 3) 345
Rendering (3ds Max
256GB RAM, the Novatech E5-1620V3 can
Design 2015) - 243 be turned into a powerful machine for
simulation. This is not really possible with a
» Graphics benchmarks
(bigger is better) Core i7-based workstation. Novatech makes
CAD (SolidWorks 2013
- SPECapc graphics
customisation easy at time of purchase
through an intuitive online configurator.
composite) - 8.30
CAD (Creo 2.0 - SPECapc
And it could benefit from a few tweaks.
graphics composite) - 8.35 The 120GB Intel 520 SSD, quoted as ‘end
of life’ on Intel.com, was disappointing.
Sequential write speeds were well below
par and CAD software took noticeably
longer to install than other machines we’ve
seen recently (reading and writing from
the same drive). However, Novatech offers
a big choice of higher performing drives,
including the excellent Samsung SS 850 Pro,
INTEL CORE i7 vs INTEL XEON CPUs
preferred workstation-class
processor, the Xeon?
The obvious answer is if you
want access to more CPU cores.
The Xeon E5-2600 v3 series,
which is supported in some single
processor machines including the
Novatech E5-1620V3, goes all the
Most of the single processor way up to 18 cores.
workstations we review at But when you start comparing
DEVELOP3D feature Intel Core Core i7 to the dedicated single
i7 CPUs. While these desktop socket Xeon E5-1600 v3 Series,
chips are considered ‘consumer- the differences are more subtle.
grade’, we have found them to be Take the Intel Xeon E5-1620 v3
perfectly adequate for professional CPU for example. Just like the
CAD work. So why invest in Intel’s Intel Core i7-4770K it has four
HARDWARE REVIEW
which is also available in larger capacities
should 120GB be too small (we only had
20GB free after installing our test suite).
Those working with memory intensive
applications may also benefit from using
four DIMM slots instead of two, enabling
the Xeon’s quad channel architecture to
deliver more memory bandwidth. 1
All of the components are housed in a
matt black chassis, which is nicely laid out
with 2 x USB 3.0 and 1 x USB 2.0 on the
top. Directly behind these is a neat HDD
/ SSD docking station where you can plug
a
in a 2.5-inch or 3.5-inch drive, much like
a Nintendo games cartridge. It’s a great
idea, particularly for those that want their
b
data to move with them, but can be a little
fiddly to guide drives into position.
Additional accessible storage can be
found behind a push and click door at the c
front of the machine that features two hot
swap drive bays, so you can plug-in and
d
remove drives without powering down.
Five internal 3.5-inch bays round out the
2
extensive storage options, populated in
our test machine with the Intel SSD and
3TB Seagate HDD.
Overall, the Novatech E5-1620V3 is an
interesting proposition for CAD users who
want the added security of ECC memory. 3
Easy access storage is a big plus, but the
machine is let down by the disappointing
SSD. But perhaps its greatest appeal
comes from its potential. With up to 14 3
CPU cores, 256GB of ECC memory and
eight drives there’s plenty to interest
simulation specialists who want a powerful
desktop for complex studies but don’t ●1 The bottom two panels on the Novatech
Eclipse chassis push open to reveal two hot-
have budget for a dual CPU machine.
swappable drive bays
Finally, the machine comes with a one
year return-to-base warranty, significantly ●2 Workstation interior ●
a ●b eight DIMM slots
for up to 256GB RAM ● c hard drive cage can hold
less than the 3 years offered by most up to five 3.5” drives ●
d Hot swappable, front
workstation manufacturers, but this can access drive bays with blind mate connectors
be extended all the way up to fives years, ●
3 HDD / SSD docking station where you can
including on site support (see box left). plug in a 2.5-inch or 3.5-inch drive
highly. The Intel Xeon E5-1620
v3 goes up to 68 GB/s thanks to
its quad channel DDR4 memory
Xeons support Error Correcting
Code (ECC) memory, whereas
Core i7 chips do not.
cores running at a nominal clock architecture while the Core ECC memory is designed to
speed of 3.5GHz. i7-4770K only reaches 25.6 GB/s reduce the chance of a memory
Setting aside the important fact with dual channel DDR3. error occurring. This shouldn’t
that specialist system builders be an issue for mainstream CAD
can readily overclock the Intel Memory capacity is also users but when you’re running
Core i7-4770K to 4.4GHz — which dramatically different, which a two day FEA simulation you
makes CAD software fly — the is crucial if you want to work want to do everything you can to
main difference between the two with complex datasets. The Core ensure it doesn’t crash half way
CPUs comes down to memory. i7-4770K peaks at 32GB, while through. While it is still highly
the Xeon E5-1620 v3 can (in unlikely a workstation with Non-
Memory bandwidth can be theory) go right up to 768GB. ECC memory will crash due to a
important for memory intensive With current machines 128GB or memory error, ECC memory does
applications, such as Finite 256GB is more common. gives you a bit more re-assurance.
Element Analysis (FEA) or However, it should be noted that
Computational Fluid Dynamics Memory reliability is perhaps ECC is a bit slower than non-ECC
(CFD) and here Xeon scores the biggest differentiator. All memory and also costs a bit more.
DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 55
 NVIDIA QUADRO
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PNY Ad.indd 1 18/02/2015 09:17

 HARDWARE REVIEW

Scan 3XS GW-HT20

» With eight CPU cores running at a whopping 4.2GHz, this single CPU workstation from
Scan offers an exciting proposition for design viz users on a budget, writes Greg Corke

D
» Intel Core i7 5960X ual CPU workstations have
Extreme Edition long been essential for those
(overclocked to
serious about rendering. And
4.2GHz) (Eight Core)
processor with the latest Intel Xeon E5-
» 16GB (4 x 4GB) 2600 v3 CPUs delivering 8, 10
Corsair Vengeance or 12 cores at decent clock speeds, there is
LPX DDR4 2,666MHz plenty here to excite hardcore users.
memory But, with high-end Xeons like the ten core
» 256GB Samsung SSD E5-2687W v3 (3.1GHz, Turbo to 3.6GHz)
850 Pro + 2TB Seagate
Barracuda HDD
costing the best part of £1,500, those
dreaming of lightning fast renders soon get
» Nvidia Quadro
K4200 (4GB GDDR5) a dose of reality when budgets are set.
GPU (341.05 driver) The good news is there is some middle
» Asus X99-S ground here and Scan’s latest 3XS GW-HT20
motherboard workstation is leading the charge. With
» Microsoft Windows 7 Intel’s Extreme Edition Core i7 5960X
Professional 64-bit processor at its heart, the Bolton-based
» 495mm (H) x 210mm manufacturer has put together a single
(W) x 484mm (D) CPU machine with a substantial eight
» 3 year warranty – 1st cores. And, unlike Intel’s Xeon CPUs,
Year Onsite, 2nd and
3rd Year return to
which are locked to their base speed,
base (Parts & Labour) the 3.0GHz chip has been clocked up to
a whopping 4.2GHz.
£2,247 + VAT This is familiar territory for Scan who
3xs.scan.co.uk has an enviable pedigree in overclocked
machines. But while we are used to seeing
» CPU benchmarks its Quad Core workstations cut through
(secs - smaller is better)
our single threaded CAD benchmarks,
CAM (Delcam PowerMill)
1) 138 2) 153 3) 180 the 3XS GW-HT20 also delivers in multi-
Rendering (3ds Max threaded visualisation software. The 111
Design 2015) - 111 seconds it took to cut through our 3ds Max
» Graphics benchmarks ray trace render might not rival the dual
(bigger is better) CPU monster that is the Lenovo ThinkStation
CAD (SolidWorks 2013 P900 (66 secs), but it stands head and
- SPECapc graphics
composite) - 9.60 shoulders above any other single CPU
CAD (Creo 2.0 - SPECapc workstation we’ve seen at DEVELOP3D.
graphics composite) - 8.73 In addition to having access to more
CPU cores, the other advantage of the
Extreme Edition Core i7 5960X processor is
higher memory bandwidth, which should
speed up some CPU operations. While
mainstream chips like the Core i7 4790K
peak at 25.6GB/s, the Core i7 5960X takes
this all the way up to 68GB/s. This is thanks
to support for faster DDR4 memory (the
Core i7 4790K supports DDR3) as well as
the quad channel memory architecture,
which means all four memory modules can
be accessed at the same time (the Core i7
4790K has two channels).
With 4 x 2,666MHz 4GB DDR4 memory
DIMMs the Scan 3XS GW-HT20 is set up
to make the most of the quad channel
architecture. However, it does mean the
are no spare slots for upgrades so choose
wisely when deciding on a spec.
Drawing 140W at peak the Extreme
Edition processor demands some serious
cooling, and to
ensure it
remains
within its thermal
limits, and fan noise is kept to a minimum,
Scan has employed a custom Corsair H100
watercooling system. This compact, sealed
unit clamps straight onto the CPU and
exchanges heat with a radiator. Two low
duty fans push out hot air through vents at
the top of the Corsair Carbide 330R chassis.
This matt black case has become a
mainstay of Scan’s 3XS workstations over
the years and is solid and well built. Two
USB 3.0 ports at the front are nicely located
at the top of the machine. Two more can be
found behind the front door panel, alongside
a media card reader and DVD drive.
However, it can be pain to have to leave the
door half open to access these. There are
more USB ports at the rear of the machine.
At 495mm x 210mm x 484mm it’s a
little bulky compared to similar machines
from Lenovo (ThinkStation P500), Dell
(Precision Tower 5810) and HP (Z440),
but the spacious interior makes for easy
servicing. Swapping out hard drives
does require both side panels to be
unscrewed and popped off, but it’s a pretty
straightforward operation.
Our test machine has a familiar two-
drive setup: a 256GB Samsung 850 PRO
SSD for Windows 7 Professional 64-bit and
applications and a 2TB Seagate Barracuda
SATA HDD for data. The 850 PRO is a
firm favourite at DEVELOP3D — both
for performance and endurance, as it is
backed up with a 10-year limited warranty
based on a 40GB daily write workload.
Graphics comes courtesy of an Nvidia
Quadro K4200 (4GB), an excellent choice
for high-end CAD that packs a real
punch. Buoyed by the 4.2GHz processor,
it delivered some excellent scores in our
SolidWorks and Creo tests. And while
the Quadro K4200 should be a good
fit for most CAD users, a £850 upgrade
to a Quadro K5200 (8GB) should boost
performance in visually intensive apps
like 3ds Max.
We’ve seen more than our fair share of
single CPU workstations over the years,
but none have packed such a punch for ray
trace rendering. With eight cores running
at 4.2GHz the Scan 3XS certainly offers an
exciting proposition for CAD users who also
need quick turnaround of photorealistic
stills and animations.
There’s also plenty to interest users of
simulation software though CAE specialists
may feel more comfortable with a Xeon-
based workstation, backed with ECC (Error
Correcting Code) memory to protect against
potential crashes on long FEA or CFD runs.

●1 The 140W CPU

is cooled with a
custom Corsair H100
1 2 3
watercooling system
●2 To add or remove
drives, both side panels
need to come off. Drive
trays can take 3.5-inch
drives and 2.5-inch
drives with an adapter.
●3 The solid, matt black
Corsair Carbide 330R
chassis is sizeable
but benefits from a
spacious interior

DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 57

 HARDWARE REVIEW
Lenovo ThinkStation P900
» This dual CPU powerhouse may come with a serious price tag, but for CAE specialists
who seek true design optimisation it should be money well spent, writes Greg Corke
T
» 2 x Intel Xeon E5- here are desktop workstations
2687W v3 (3.1GHz, and then there are behemoths
Turbo to 3.6GHz) (Ten like the ThinkStation P900.
Core) processors
And Lenovo’s flagship P-Series
» 128GB (16 x 8GB) workstation is a beast, with
DDR4 2,133MHz ECC
RDIMM memory performance to support the most demanding
» 512GB M.2 SSD + product development workflows and
512GB SATA SSD overflowing with expansion options.
» Nvidia Quadro Fully loaded it can hold two high-end
K5200 (8GB GDDR5) Xeon E5-2600 v3 Series CPUs, 512GB DDR4
GPU (347.25 driver) memory, three double width GPUs (for
» Microsoft Windows graphics or compute) and 14 storage devices.
7 Professional 64-bit If you need a workstation that can deliver
(pre-installed through
downgrade rights in the compute performance and I/O that ultra
Windows 8.1 Pro 64) high-end Computer Aided Engineering (CAE)
» 446mm (H) x 200mm or design viz demands this is it.
(W) x 620mm (D) The chassis is substantial but its solid
» Three-year limited metal frame oozes quality. Weighing in at
warranty with on-site, around 30kg — the best part of a business
next business-day flight luggage allowance — and with
service for parts and
labour dimensions of 200mm (W) x 620mm (D)
x 446mm (H) you’ll need a spacious and
£12,213 ($18,686) sturdy work environment.
lenovo.com Hauling it into position is made easier
thanks to two handles at the front and one
» CPU benchmarks at the back. They are totally integrated into
(secs - smaller is better) the main body of the chassis, making for an
CAM (Delcam PowerMill)
1) 165 2) 167 3) 172
elegant and robust design.
Rendering (3ds Max The biggest innovations are inside
Design 2015) - 66 the box, where Lenovo has made every
» Graphics benchmarks component eminently serviceable. Red
(bigger is better) touch points draw the eye to those that
CAD (SolidWorks 2013 can be removed and replaced without a
- SPECapc graphics
composite) - 9.37
screwdriver. This not only includes drives
CAD (Creo 2.0 - SPECapc and PCIe cards, but the Power Supply Unit
graphics composite) - 8.62 (PSU), fans and even the motherboard are
tool-less by design.
The drive trays are a particular delight.
Simply pull out a tray, clip in the drive(s)
and push back in. Thanks to a blind connect
backplane, there are no cables to worry
about as drives automatically connect to
power and data.
There are four trays in total: two at the
bottom and two at the top of the spacious
interior. Each is designed to house one
3.5-inch drive and one 2.5-inch drive.
1 2
58 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
There’s a big choice of SATA SSDs, SATA
HDDs, SAS HDDs and hybrid drives to
suit all requirements. RAID 0, 1, 5, and
10 is supported on the motherboard for
performance, fault tolerance or data
redundancy. SAS drives require an optional
HDD controller.
While most users will be content with the
standard drive bays, there are some other
interesting options.
Two additional drives can be added to the
FLEX Bays at the front of the machine. This
could be of particular interest to those who
frequently swap drives — perhaps to store
overnight in a safe — as access is possible
without having to remove the side panel.
For those that want PCIe storage, and the
bandwidth advantages it has over SATA,
there’s room for up to four 512GB M.2
SSDs. One or two of these tiny drives can
be housed on a bespoke small footprint
FLEX Connector card, a technology unique
to Lenovo that provides a way to expand
storage (as well as future I/O technologies
like Thunderbolt 2) without taking up a full
sized PCIe slot.
THE TEST MACHINE
The Lenovo ThinkStation P900 certainly
takes first prize for most expensive
workstation we’ve seen at DEVELOP3D.
With two top-end Intel Xeon CPUs, 128GB
DDR4 memory, fast PCIe and SATA SSD
storage and a high-end Quadro K5200 GPU
our test machine will set you back just
over £12,000 ($18,500).
The Xeon E5-2687W v3 CPU is Intel’s
‘workstation’-specific Xeon chip. With ten
cores running at 3.10GHz it is designed
to offer the best balance of CPU cores
against clock speed — which is good
news for both single threaded CAD tools
and multithreaded ray trace rendering,
simulation and CAM applications.
The benchmark figures speak for
themselves with the ThinkStation P900
delivering excellent scores in our CPU
intensive 3ds Max and Delcam PowerMill
tests. However, it’s interesting to note
that the HP Z640 we reviewed last month
(tinyurl.com/HPZ640-D3D), which featured
two eight core, 3.2GHz Intel Xeon E5-2667
v3 CPUs, still came out slightly on top in
these tests. It’s not what we would have
predicted.
The ThinkStation P900 certainly benefits
from its high-end Quadro K5200 GPU,
which delivered a strong performance in
our SolidWorks and Creo tests and will
be a good match for those pushing the
boundaries in design viz applications like
3ds Max. Those focused on simulation,
rather than visualisation, may consider
cutting back here to a Quadro K2200 or
K4200, and perhaps adding one or more
compute boards like the Nvidia Tesla K20 or
Xeon Phi 3120A. Of course, this depends on
budget and application support.
With 128GB (16 x 8GB) of DDR4 system
memory the ThinkStation P900 is set up
to handle some hugely complex datasets.
It laughed in the face of our attempts to
stress it, delivering the results from four
concurrent toolpath calculations in almost
the time it took to do one. To put this
in perspective, a quad core, single CPU
workstation, would typically take around
four times as long.
Indeed, with 20 CPU cores and 128GB
DDR4 memory to play with there’s plenty of
scope for running multiple compute tasks at
the same time. This should be of particular
interest to users of Finite Element Analysis
(FEA) or Computational Fluid Dynamics
(CFD) software looking to get quick
performance feedback on different design
options in an iterative workflow.
While 128GB RAM seems an incredible
amount for a desktop workstation, the
machine can actually go all the way up to
512GB. This should be of particular interest
to those really pushing the boundaries of
desktop simulation, though would add a
cool $11,000 onto the price of the machine.
3
 Of course, having buckets of processing
power and memory is no good without fast
storage to back it up. And with a 512GB M.2
SSD and 512 SATA SSD our test machine
scores highly.
Running over the PCIe bus the 512GB
M.2 SSD boasts two to three times the
bandwidth of SATA, which is great for
reading and writing huge datasets very
quickly. And with a 512GB SATA SSD for
support there’s scope to share the load
between drives. With space for 12 more
drives it is possible to build some complex,
high performance disk arrays.
With only 1TB in total, the obvious omission
from this machine is capacity; not a problem
if you connect direct into a server or NAS,
but adding a couple of 4TB SATA drives
will hardly break the bank — presuming, of
course, it isn’t broken already.
And this brings us nicely back to the topic
of price and our closing thoughts. No doubt
there will be designers and engineers that
baulk at the idea of buying a workstation
that costs as much as a family hatchback.
And if you run CAD, with a little bit of
simulation or rendering, then by all means
get a £2,000 single CPU workhorse and bag
7
yourself a Ford Fiesta out of the change.
But if you’re heavily into design
visualisation — and particularly simulation
— then the ThinkStation P900 is certainly
one to watch. Optimise the hell out of your
design / simulate / iterate workflows and
you could pay for the machine in one project.
Of course, there are less expensive
configurations — Lenovo showed us a base
model starting at £1,700 — but this kind of
●
1 The internals are neatly laid out with four drive bays ●
6 The M.2 SSD is housed on a FLEX Connector, a bespoke,
misses the point. The ThinkStation P900 located along the right for easy access small footprint PCIe card. The P900 includes two FLEX
is all about delivering ultimate power and Connector ports: the second can be used to accommodate
●
2 Each drive tray can house 1 x 2.5-inch drive and 1 x 3.5-
add-on technologies such as RAID cards and additional
expandability. Settling for an entry-level inch drive. Both clip in easily.
model would be a bit like buying a Ferrari I/O - including Thunderbolt or card readers
●
2 A blind connect backplane at the rear of the drive bay
with a Ford Fiesta engine. means drives automatically connect to power and data ●
7 The solid chassis features integrated handles top and
bottom and four nicely spaced USB 3.0 ports. One USB
● The Power Supply Unit pulls out for easy servicing
4
port is always on so you can charge your smartphone
To read more about the customisation ●
5 Fans feature blind connectors for easy replacement when the machine is off. Another can be used for
features of the ThinkStation P900, check out or cleaning. Fan noise was noticeable when idle but diagnostics - an error log can be downloaded to an
our preview (tinyurl.com/D3D-Think) remained at the same level even under heavy loading Android or Windows phone or tablet or a USB stick

4 5 6

DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 59

DEVELOP3DSERVICES
To advertise YOUR services here contact STEVE KING
STEVE@X3DMEDIA.com | +44 (0) 20 3355 7314 | +44 (0)7850 507362

Welcome to DEVELOP3D’s professional

services section for product development
+PIO
&XBOT
%FTJHO
professionals.
*OEVTUSJBM
%FTJHO
To see your service advertised here,
please contact Steve King. .FDIBOJDBM
&OHJOFFSJOH
steve@x3dmedia.com 3BQJE
1SPUPUZQJOH
+44 (0)20 3355 7314 / +44 (0)7850 507362
1SPEVDU
*NQMFNFOUBUJPO
4PVSDJOH



]

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XXXKPIOFXBOTEFTJHODPVL

Product
Design

World class design

and analysis to the
Composites,
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60 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM

DEVELOP3DJOBS
Welcome to DEVELOP3D’s jobs section.
Every issue we will bring you the latest product development
jobs to help you kick start your career.

In partnership with CADjobhunter.com we also have a dynamic

jobs website where you can find your dream job by searching by location,
keyword or CAD/CAM/CAE software.
Alternatively upload your CV to help your future employer find you.
Register your details at

jobs.develop3d.com
To advertise on the website or
inside the magazine contact
Matt Wells
matt@x3dmedia.com
+44 (0) 7990 573624

Technical-Sales-2015-Half-Page-Develop3D_v1.pdf 1 15/01/2015 11:27:47

To advertise Contact Matt Wells | matt@x3dmedia.com | +44 (0) 7990 573624 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 61
 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM

Mechanical Design
Engineer
Twickenham, United Kingdom

The National Physical Laboratory (NPL) is one of the UK’s leading science facilities and research centres. It is a world-leading
centre of excellence in developing and applying the most accurate standards, science and technology.

The Opportunity
We have an exciting opportunity to join our team of engineers work alongside scientist to create unique pieces of
equipment and machinery to help aid their discovery or projects. Sometimes working to tight time scales, technical
precision or budgets while keeping an impeccably high standard.

The Person
t
Served a mechanical engineering apprenticeship in the manufacture of precision parts, tooling making or similar
t
Has knowledge and understanding of the manufacturing techniques for precision parts in the one-off/low volume
environment
t
Has minimum qualification at HNC/HND level in mechanical engineering, preferably educated to degree standard in
Mechanical Engineering
t
Minimum of 5 years design experience in a relevant field, i.e. design of; bespoke machinery, mechanical assemblies,
mechanical equipment or instruments, bespoke complex assemblies
t
Experienced with CATIA V5 or SolidWork to design on machinery for one off builds

www.npl.co.uk
For more information please contact
Thalia Jones on 02089436105 or email thalia.jones@npl.co.uk

More deTails aT hTTp://goo.gl/iKs76u

More deTails aT hTTp://goo.gl/udQFpp

62 MARCH 2015 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM To adverTise ConTaCT MaTT Wells | MaTT@x3dMedia.CoM | +44 (0) 7990 573624
 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM

Make JCB
your future.
ALIAS Industrial Designer
Staff position - JCB World Headquarters - Staffordshire, UK

Closing date : 13th March 2015

MORE DETAILS AT http://goo.gl/uNHmn9

Alias ad.indd 1 18/02/2015 11:12
To advertise Contact Matt Wells | matt@x3dmedia.com | +44 (0) 7990 573624 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 63
 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM

Where next?
Wherever you take us.

DESIGN, MECHANICAL AND RESEARCH ENGINEERS

£COMPETITIVE | WILTSHIRE, UK

What’s next for Dyson? You tell us. Actually, you won’t just tell us, you’ll show us. Because we’ll give you
the freedom to invent, to pursue your ideas and to push technological boundaries.
Great things are happening here. Not only are we working on some incredible new projects, but we’re
continuing to invest heavily in our UK Research, Design and Development (RDD) centre. Which tells you
two things. Firstly, that we’re doing fantastically well as a global business. Secondly, just how vitally
important engineers are to us. In many ways, engineers are Dyson. That’s why we’re looking for more
like minds to join us and create the technology of the future.
So if you’re unafraid to take risks and ready to turn conventional thinking on its head, we need to hear
from you. Your background could be mechanical engineering, technology, science.... we’re open to
ideas. Find out more at www.careers.dyson.com

MORE DETAILS AT http://goo.gl/aKWU82

64 MARCH 2015 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM To advertise Contact Matt Wells | matt@x3dmedia.com | +44 (0) 7990 573624
 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM

SHARE IDEAS TO CREATE

MEANINGFUL INNOVATIONS
THROUGH 3D PRINTING

To adverTise ConTaCT MaTT Wells | MaTT@x3dMedia.CoM | +44 (0) 7990 573624 JOBS.DEVELOP3D.COM MARCH 2015 65
 THE LAST WORD
Prototyping is a curious process. It’s part
experimentation, part black art and part
luck. Al Dean has been pondering the
tools we have available to us today
and discovers that the pursuit of
perfection isn’t the be all and end all
I
’ve been lucky enough to be able
to spend time with a whole range
of different prototyping methods
over the last few months, as
you’ll have seen from the last few
issues (and there’s more to come). I’ve
been in the workshop with not only a
range of 3D printers, but also a small
scale CNC machine from Roland. That’s
meant a lot of experimentation and
small scale projects to enable me to
realistically complete them during the
loan period.
One such project is a mounting bracket for
my daughter’s wheelchair in the back of the
car. Anyone that’s cared for someone in a
wheelchair (or indeed, has one themselves)
will know that these things are massive and
tend to take up a lot of space — and when
running a smaller vehicle, you’re pretty
much left with no usable space.
Handily, the current car has a set of
luggage mounting bars that run down the
sides of the luggage space. They’ve also got
some nifty little clips for hanging items on.
One quick look at these and it’s evident that
they’re ripe for a quick redesign to make
something a little more suitable to hold the
wheelchair out of the way and free up some
of that boot space.
After pulling the existing clips out, a quick
inspection showed that this was indeed the
case, so I set about modelling something up.
Of course, unless you’re ultra precise with
measurements, you’re never going to get an
exact match for the production part, but it
seemed close enough. So, the next step was
knocking up a quick prototype.
As anyone that’s dealt with 3D printers will
know, the words “prototype” and “quick”
aren’t particularly well matched. Handily,
I’ve just taken delivery of one of the early
units from Autodesk’s Ember Explorer
program. This is essentially a beta test unit
for those who got in early and will help
Autodesk work through some issues and
build up the Spark platform to assist with all
the prep work involved in 3D printing.
At the moment, the workflow is a little
fractured, but it works and works well
once you’ve learned the ins and outs of the
machine and the resin you’re running (pro
tip: always check the operating temperature
range if your office or workshop is a little
66 MARCH 2015 DEVELOP3D.COM
on the chilly side). Using Meshmixer to
generate the supports (see Figure 2), I found
that I was running things rather tight to the
build envelope of the machine — but on I
soldiered.
The machine was calibrated and set
running. It’s here that I came up against
the problem with working in a workshop in
the British winter time. Light curable resins
operate best at temperatures somewhere in
the region on 18 degrees and above. 1
Of course, when trying to get a job
done and the heater is taking its time,
the temperature is often way below that.
What happens is the viscosity of the resin
increases and this, in combination with
localised heat build up in the parts (where
they’re cured), results in failed parts.
All of this is well known. Except I forgot
and cracked on anyway.
Failed builds are par for the course with
any 3D printer, but it’s easy to forget even
the most basic of these things when you’re 2
in the middle of a project.
The end result was a half complete
component. Luckily, the machine works
quickly, but still it was an annoying
occurrence, particularly when you know it’s
a simple mistake that could have easily been
avoided.
ALL IS NOT LOST
But what I noticed with these half built parts
is that they gave me just enough to try out
the geometry I’d put together, in terms of
fit around those luggage racks as well as
holding the webbing straps that would hold 3
the wheelchair in place.
That struck me as an interesting thing
and something that I’d experienced, but not that now allows it to print at 200 microns. ●1 Part quickly
really formalised before. Prototypes are As with all layer based processes, layer knocked up in Fusion
and exported as an STL
meant to be rough and ready, particularly thickness is one of the key drivers to speed.
during those early stages of the design Autodesk is also working on a resin for its ●2 Pushing the limits
of the Ember’s build
process, where you’re trying ideas and Ember printer that will allow similar build tray
checking fit and function. parameters and speed.
The 3D print industry’s obsession with This is all incredibly exciting but
●3 FormLabs now
supports 200 micron
resolution is all well and good, but perhaps sometimes I wonder if what we really need is lasers, reducing the
we should be focussing on getting a model the digital equivalent of a block of blue foam build times for most
out of these machines more quickly, rather and ten minutes on a bandsaw, rather than parts, giving you a
than slowly at a ridiculous resolution. something that will give us ultra fine detail. quicker cycle time
It would also seem some of the vendors
agree. FormLabs recently announced an Al is now thinking that a bandsaw might be a
update to the software for its Form 1+ good idea. His fingers? Not so much.
machine and a new variant of its resin al@x3dmedia.com
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