Penn State Printer Head for Extruded Clay
The Pennsylvania State University (PSU) School of Visual Arts and College of Engineering are currently in development of an open source clay 3D printing head for use on a variety of open source machines. The project was started in the Fall semester of 2015 and is currently being developed by two new teams for the Spring 2016 semester.
This project is still a work in progress with more updates coming soon.
Project Overview
The ever growing field of 3D printing, more specifically open source 3D printers, caused the PSU School of Visual Arts to have interest in investigated 3D printing as a medium for artists and designers. The ability to print 3D objects in a variety of mediums and the ability to create the 3D printer itself opened up a plethora of design potentials.
The School of Visual Arts soon decided to attempt 3D printing in clay, though not many open source options existed. The School enlisted the help of the College of Engineering and sponsored a Capstone Design Project for the Engineering seniors. The seniors represented every type of engineering at Penn State.
Phase I, Fall 2016
Phase II, Spring 2016
The second phase of the extruded clay printer head is a continuation on the foundations formed by the Fall 2015 group. The second phase began with improvements on the design. The mechanical engineering team focused on most of the design aspects with a key goal to replace the, then current, pneumatic extrusion head with a mechanical feed utilizing a stepper motor. The industrial engineering team focused on designing experimental procedures to fine tune the print settings for after most of the design and build work was complete.
Both teams, early in the semester, constructed a Prusa i3 printer kit to familiarize group members, additional, with 3D printers. The Prusa i3 is being used as a printer for the clay head.
