While 3D printing technologies have only recently began finding their way into dozens of industries and research institutions, the technology has been used for dental and jewelry applications for years. One of the most popular types of 3D printers for these markets has been those that use light-cured resins capable of producing small and highly detailed 3D models. When it comes to 3D printing very small objects with extremely fine details, Digital Light Processing (DLP) technology is rapidly growing in popularity. DLP 3D printers are faster than standard FDM and stereolithography (SLA) 3D printers, and they are often capable of producing some of the highest resolution parts on the market.
The MiiCraft 125 DLP 3D Printer.
Taiwan-based Young Optics has been manufacturing high-quality commercial DLP desktop 3D printers since 2012 under the brandname MiiCraft. They have primarily manufactured very small scale 3D printers with small build envelopes, even producing the world’s smallest DLP 3D printer the MiiCraft+ last year. Last month they flipped the script and announced that they were releasing their largest DLP 3D printer ever, the MiiCraft 125 Series desktop 3D printer. This week Young Optics has officially released the MiiCraft 125 series, and those looking to make a purchase can contact them directly at sales@miicraft.com.
While still comparatively tiny when compared to more common FDM 3D printers, the MiiCraft 125 really bumped up their build envelope to a respectable 125 x 70 x 120 mm (4.9 x 2.7 x 4.7 inch). It is capable of a printing resolution as fine as 0.065mm on the X and Y axes and layers as thin as 0.005mm. The larger build volume on the MiiCraft 125 offers jewelry designers and dental practices the option of printing more models in one single printing session without sacrificing the productivity and quality of their previous MiiCraft 3D printer models.
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- Dentures and partial dental appliances.
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- Custom 3D printed teeth straightening appliances.
The MiiCraft 125 is an ideal 3D printer for the accurate production of complex jewelry designs, dentures, dental appliances or any applications that requires the production of microstructures. It was designed to offer the user flexible control over printing settings so it can be used for several different 3D printing applications. The 125 series lets the user control multiple printer parameter settings, including the resin curing time, the layer curing speed and the peeling steps, all from a user-friendly interface. There are a wide variety of 3D printing resin materials available, including those optimized for standard models, castable burn away materials and several materials optimized for research applications. MiiCraft offers their own resin materials for sale, however their printers are compatible with third party resins.
3D printed jewelry to be used as jewelry casts.
The fine detail and printing quality of the MiiCraft 125 series’ DLP technology is made possible because of the high resolution chip that manages the printer’s optics and controls the accuracy of the uniform images projected on to the materials in the building platform. Because it uses a light projector rather than the UV lasers used by SLA 3D printers, entire layers can be cured at the same time rather than SLA’s point to point curing. Not only does that speed up the printing process, but it accurately produces the fine details on the final printed models. You can find out more information about the MiiCraft 125 series DLP 3D printers here. Discuss further in the MiiCraft 3D Printer forum over at 3DPB.com.
