Product Information

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud.

exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum

dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit, sed do eiusmod tempor incididunt ut labore et dolore magna aliqua. Ut enim ad minim veniam, quis nostrud exercitation ullamco laboris nisi ut aliquip ex ea commodo consequat. Duis aute irure dolor in reprehenderit in voluptate velit esse cillum dolore eu fugiat nulla pariatur. Excepteur sint occaecat cupidatat non proident, sunt in culpa qui officia deserunt mollit anim id est laborum.

MOBILE 3D PRINTING

One primitive manufacturing task is depositing and joining materials at specified locations. 3D printing is an automation of this task, which is one of the most versatile digital manufacturing technologies. Therefore, we developed the first member of our mobile robot crew - a wirelessly controlled mobile robot that can deposit and join materials for 3D printing.

DIGITAL ASSEMBLY

Assembly is another primitive task for manufacturing any sophisticated product. Therefore, we developed a pick-and-place mobile robot for digital assembly to be the second member of our mobile robot crew. More crew members are being developed, such as tape laying robot, inkjet robot, adhesive printing robot, screw driving robot, etc.

CHUNK-BASED 3D PRINTING

To ensure the speed of the 3D printing process is not limited by the size of the object, we developed a new chunk-based 3D printing method, which divides an object into smaller chunks to be printed individually. The chunk-based printing method keeps the 3D printing process localized and solves many issues that arise when the size of the object increases (e.g., warping issue, accuracy control, wait times). The chunk-based printing method has been validated in a tensile strength study, which showed the chunk-bond to be stronger than a regularly 3D printed part.

Button label

SWARM 3D PRINTING

To enable a swarm of mobile robots working together without causing conflicts, meticulous planning is needed, just like how a team of humans would work together to accomplish a project. In autonomous manufacturing, software is needed to analyze the digital model, split it into smaller tasks, assign the tasks to different robots, and schedule the robots to finish the tasks in sequence and in parallel. We have developed the necessary software for both swarm 3D printing and for placing pre-made parts into print jobs using gripper robots. A swarm of 16 mobile 3D printers working together to print a 3D map of Arkansas is shown here.