Tools And Facilities (2)
Over a period of five years, the School of Engineering at the University of Greenwich has acquired a range of advanced machine tools and rapid prototyping equipment to support its undergraduate and taught postgraduate programmes. A listing of equipment is set out in the following sections:
3D Systems Wax Printer
This machine provides the capability to manufacture patterns for use in the lost wax investment casting process. Wax patterns continue to offer environmental benefits over resin patterns. Wax patterns are produced through STL file transfer from the majority of contemporary computer aided design (CAD) programs.
Stratasys Dimension Fusion Deposition System
Fusion deposition modelling (FDM) enables the manufacture of Acrylic Butadiene Styrene (ABS) models direct from STL format files. This process eliminates the expense of manufacturing an injection mould or machining a prototype from a solid block of material. The illustrations depict a range of models manufactured with the FDM machine.
Renishaw Cyclone 3D Scanner
This enables the co-ordinates of complex shapes to be captured by contact with a stylus traversed across the work piece. The completed scan can be imported into software used to compile programs for CNC machine tools. The scanning technique can eliminate the significant labour costs that could be expected when designs are copied by taking individual measurements of an artifact manually and then transferring this data into CAD packages.
CAD-CAM Software
The School uses a range of industrial CAD and computer aided manufacturing (CAM) packages in combination with its machine tools. Those studying on undergraduate, postgraduate and short courses will gain experience in component design, off-line programming of machine tools and reverse engineering techniques.
Manufacture of FDM and Wax Patterns
On request, the Renishaw Centre will provide quotations for the manufacture of fusion deposition models and wax patterns from STL files provided by potential clients.