3D Glass printer
For many years, glass production has not changed. We believe it is time for a change.
We have more and more demand for personalised glass bottles and drinking glasses. On the one hand, there is demand for printed objects, but on the other hand also for shapes. This means different shapes of bottles and glasses. At present, it is not possible to produce small quantities and so we thought it would be a good idea to 3D-print glass. We contacted ETH Zurich for the cool project we are running now.
The procedure
Existing glass manufacturing techniques are limited not only in the material composition available, but also in the complexity and resolution achievable. Our approach uses a hybrid resin as raw material and a fully light-controlled 3D-printing process. This facilitates a wide range of compositions and high resolution printing techniques.
Besides printing multi-component glasses with complex shapes and high resolution, we are also able to introduce porosity in the glass by controlling the light intensity used during the printing process. This could pave the way for producing highly efficient chemical reactors.
The future
We do not only see big potential for 3D-printing of glass bottles and drinking glasses, we also see potential in micro-fluidics, jewellery, and other applications we do not know yet. We look forward to further collaboration with ETH to develop this new technology and to introduce it to the market as soon as possible.
Glass from a 3D printer
ETH researchers are using a 3D printing method to produce complex, highly porous glass structures.