Before and After SLA Printing : Comparison
Reduction in Prototyping Cost
Shorter Production Costs
Problem
Paralenz are a company who are behind the Paralenz dive camera which has been under development for 15 years. Due to its incredible design, the camera is able to film and capture high quality footage, even when taken at extreme depths.
Previously, when Paralenz would be prototyping their product, they used FDM printing. Due to the nature of FDM printing, the prototyping process became costly and time ineffective, as well as being rather unreliable with many prints failing out of every 200. Overall, Paralenz were finding that immediate changes needed to be made to ensure that they were wasting no time in their manufacturing workflow.
Solution
Through the introduction of a Formlabs Form 2 Stereolithography (SLA) machine into their design process, Paralenz were instantly able to iterate through various prototypes at speed. According to Paralenz, this was possible due to how parts printed by the Form 2 “[are] closer to being finished straight out of the machine. FDM models
take about three times as long to get a high-end finish, and with many parts the same finish is impossible.” Additionally, compared to their previous FDM printers, the Form 2 has been the printer that Paralenz can always rely on, with only 1 job failed out of the 200 given to the machine. Overall, Paralenz has seen a increase in production alongside a decrease in costs since their introduction of their new SLA printer and wish to encourage others to do the same.
