MEDICAL ELECTRONICS Accelerating R&DwithmicroAM
The first time I heard the term“micro 3D printing” was a couple of years agowhen I sawan image on LinkedIn presenting a tiny 3D printed part on a finger. “Incredible,” I thought tomyself, “such a small part and so accuratewith an amazing level of detail. Butwho needsmicro parts and why?What are the possible applications for this type of technology, andwhat kind of challenges can it potentially solve?” Gil Lavi, Founder & CEO 3DEvaluate investigates
3D printing technology after visiting a medical device start-up company that was facing an interesting challenge in their R&D process.
R
BEFORE MICRO 3D PRINTING AntiShock, Haifa, Israel, is an innovative medical device start-up company that develops a disposable, non-invasive, continuous monitoring system that measures patients’ systemic fluid responsiveness (preventing intravenous [IV] fluid overload). Fluid overload is a common condition among intensive care unit (ICU) patients that not only has negative financial and clinical implications, but more importantly can cause organ failure, and — in severe cases - death. To solve this challenge, AntiShock is developing a breakthrough electro-optical sensing medical device based on a tiny electro-optical sensor. This sensing device is built out of several small mechanical moving components that have to be strong and accurate. Therefore, to validate its product and produce a working prototype device, AntiShock had to locate and use advanced and accurate manufacturing technologies. The two leading manufacturing technologies that were chosen were CNC and the stereolithography (SLA) 3D printing process that gave AntiShock the ability to create the first product mock-up. However, when moving to a more advanced stage in their R&D, the company confronted a very
ecently I had the pleasure of gaining a better understanding of the uses of micro
Dmitri Khalilov, Co-founder and CTO at AntiShock labs. (Image source: 3D Evaluate)
challenging task - it needed to produce a small dimension highly detailed component (about 1mm in diameter). SLA 3D printing could not provide the required levels of details and accuracy, and while CNC could, it was extremely expensive. R&D came to a hold, and a new design solution was required.
MICRO 3D PRINTING While searching for a solution to their problem, Dmitry Khalilov, co-founder and CTO of AntiShock came across Nanofabrica - the developer and manufacturer of an innovative and disruptive micro 3D printing system. Curious and intrigued, he made contact with Avi Cohen, Nanofabrica’s EVP sales, presenting the challenge and the company’s requirement to produce the small dimension/highly detailed component. The challenge went beyond printing the component, there was also a need to print a small size thread (with a non-standard pitch) and fit a small screw on top of it, The components had to fit each other perfectly, and the 3D printed component had to be strong enough to sustain mechanical loads. After reviewing the part’s size, geometry, thickness, and estimating the mechanical loads it had to withstand, Nanofabrica accepted the challenge and decided to print the part. After delivering a CAD file, it took only a few days before the Antishock R&D team had the 3D printed part in their hands! Excited and intrigued, they examined the part under a microscope to evaluate the levels of accuracy and to verify that the required details had been produced.
The results were beyond their expectations.
The 3D printed part had passed their first qualification step! But would it fit the small metal screw? After carefully assembling the parts it was found to be a perfect fit!
WHAT MADE MICRO 3D PRINTING SO VALUABLE? After summarising all the data and comparing the use of micro 3D printing to CNC and SLA, AntiShock came to the following conclusions that made clear what the advantages of using micro 3D printing in their R&D process are: • Accuracyanddetails – First of all, it had the ability to provide the challenging levels of detail and accuracy required. 3D printing such a small part is not simple and definitely requires the use of a non- standard process.
• Geometry – Micro 3D printing promotes design freedom, and so facilitated the production of this part (and future ones), without many of the limitations associated with more conventional production processes.
• Delivery time – The delivery time for a five 3D printed parts was one day. Using CNC, five parts would have taken between 3-4 days.
• Costs – Producing a small dimension/ highly precise part via the CNC process would cost several hundreds of dollars, while using micro 3D printing it cost 80% less.
ABOVE: The threaded screw inside AntiShock's medical device.
RIGHT: Perfect fit! (Image source: AntiShock Ltd.)
PROBLEM SOLVED It took less than a week for AntiShock’s team to solve their problem using Nanofabrica’s micro 3D printing technology which they had never used before. The fact that micro 3D printing was able to produce the required part, opened up a wide choice of possibilities for the company for future R&D of its existing and still to be developed devices. Micro 3D printing was a perfect complementary technology to CNC and SLA 3D printing, which was used for producing the bigger
parts needed for the device.
www.nano-fabrica.com
52 SEPTEMBER 2021 | ELECTRONICS TODAY
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58
