ZMorph has officially arrived in the United States. We’ve been following the Polish company for some time, as they made plans to open an office in San Francisco earlier this year. The ZMorph San Francisco office officially opened in September. And they’re not done yet; now that they have settled in, ZMorph plans to move more of their staff and resources into the country in 2016. In the meantime, they’ve been busy building relationships with universities within the US, including Stanford University’s Product Realization Lab and the University of Southern California School of Architecture. ZMorph has also been working tirelessly to get their products into the hands of American retailers, and they hope that they will have a presence established on Amazon by Christmas.
They’ve also been adding yet more capabilities to their multi-headed beast of a fabrication machine. Also in September, ZMorph introduced three new toolheads that can be purchased individually or as a three-in-one package:
- ZMorph Dual Pro Extruder can print two different plastic materials with similar temperature ranges at one time, either separately or blended together
- ZMorph CNC PRO Milling Toolhead allows milling, cutting and engraving in both 2D and 3D
- ZMorph Thick Paste Extruder enables 2D printing and simple volumetric 3D printing of dense masses like silicone, porcelain, ceramics and even food paste like cake or chocolate
The three new toolheads bring the grand total of the printer’s functions to twelve. Przemek Jaworski, founder and CEO of ZMorph, recently spoke to Product Design and Development about the challenges of developing the machine, which has been a continual work in progress. The tricky part, he said, was the development of the software behind each of the toolheads.
“The biggest challenge was always creating the software and plug-ins that could run them,” Jaworski said. “Behind each of these toolheads there is a story about how the software and the algorithms were developed to make it run in the best way and create tool paths that create objects in a completely different way.”
The new Dual Pro Extruder was a special challenge. While it was constructed like a standard extruder, the nozzle required 15 prototypes before they company finally arrived at one that could print with two materials, either individually or mixed together. Now that the newest updates have been released, the company has no plans to sit back and relax, according to Jaworski. While their machine, which he has described as a “mini factory,” is perhaps the most versatile piece of equipment on the market, the competition is close behind.
