From 3D Printing to 3D Sensing

Advanced/additive manufacturing is predicted to be one of the fastest growing technological sectors for the foreseeable future. This technology allows for rapid prototyping of custom shapes, and the identification/elimination of potential manufacturing flaws early during the design stages. From a systems perspective, a 3D printer consists of an extruder and a motion system for positioning in 3D space. In the presentation we will describe how we retrofitted a fused deposition modeling (FDM) 3D printer to function as a sensor. In order to achieve this goal, we modified the firmware to combine sensor position and the corresponding sensor reading for post-processing, and changed the gearing of the stepper motors. Our reliability tests show that the positioning accuracy with these modifications is \textasciitilde 10 micron. Here we discuss the results of two ongoing projects, using a Hall probe to measure the three components of the magnetic field of a disc magnet. The second application is a first step to establish if the reflectivity of the 3D printed filament is sufficiently high that the control of the volumetric flow rate can be used for in-situ print optimization and verification, which is one of the largest current challenges in additive manufacturing.