Pusch Kira, Hinton Thomas J, Feinberg Adam W
Department of Materials Science & Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, United States.
Department of Biomedical Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, United States.
HardwareX. 2018 Apr;3:49-61. doi: 10.1016/j.ohx.2018.02.001. Epub 2018 Feb 12.
Syringe pump extruders are required for a wide range of 3D printing applications, including bioprinting, embedded printing, and food printing. However, the mass of the syringe becomes a major challenge for most printing platforms, requiring compromises in speed, resolution and/or volume. To address these issues, we have designed a syringe pump large volume extruder (LVE) that is compatible with low-cost, open source 3D printers, and herein demonstrate its performance on a PrintrBot Simple Metal. Key aspects of the LVE include: (1) it is open source and compatible with open source hardware and software, making it inexpensive and widely accessible to the 3D printing community, (2) it utilizes a standard 60 mL syringe as its ink reservoir, effectively increasing print volume of the average bioprinter, (3) it is capable of retraction and high speed movements, and (4) it can print fluids using nozzle diameters as small as 100 µm, enabling the printing of complex shapes/objects when used in conjunction with the freeform reversible embedding of suspended hydrogels (FRESH) 3D printing method. Printing performance of the LVE is demonstrated by utilizing alginate as a model biomaterial ink to fabricate parametric CAD models and standard calibration objects.
注射泵挤出机在广泛的3D打印应用中都是必需的，包括生物打印、嵌入式打印和食品打印。然而，注射器的质量对大多数打印平台来说是一个重大挑战，这就需要在速度、分辨率和/或打印量方面做出妥协。为了解决这些问题，我们设计了一种与低成本、开源3D打印机兼容的注射泵大容量挤出机（LVE），并在此展示其在PrintrBot Simple Metal上的性能。LVE的关键特性包括：（1）它是开源的，与开源硬件和软件兼容，使其价格低廉且3D打印社区广泛可用；（2）它使用标准的60 mL注射器作为墨水箱，有效增加了普通生物打印机的打印量；（3）它能够进行回缩和高速运动；（4）它可以使用直径小至100 µm的喷嘴打印流体，与悬浮水凝胶自由形式可逆嵌入（FRESH）3D打印方法结合使用时能够打印复杂形状/物体。通过使用海藻酸钠作为模型生物材料墨水来制造参数化CAD模型和标准校准物体来展示LVE的打印性能。
