Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) researchers have come up with a rapid new way of 3D printing furniture. Known as Liquid Metal Printing, the process sees aluminum deposited from a ceramic nozzle, in a way that’s said to be 10x faster than other similar technologies.
At present, their approach does so at the expense of resolution, with resulting structures featuring a distinctly unpolished look. But it has already been used to 3D print larger parts than is traditionally possible, including prototypes such as chair legs. The MIT technique is also more accessible, in that it’s open to a wider range of materials.
In future, it’s thought Liquid Metal Printing could be used with recycled metal scraps to create more eco-friendly tables, chairs, or even entire buildings. Not wanting to scale their ambitions too high, the team admits that it’s not currently reliable enough to do so. But, with further R&D, they say it could one day be a “game-changer in metal manufacturing.”
Discover more about the MIT rapid metal 3D printing project here.
