Session: DED Design Tool Showcase

Paper Number: 148422

148422 - Ecometrics3d: Plugin for Material Extrusion 3d Printing Slicer Software 

Material extrusion using polymers (often called fused filament fabrication, FFF, or 3D printing) is ubiquitous, from prototyping to final production. However, users who use this process may not have easy access to information about the environmental impact of 3D printing or the decisions they can make to reduce such impact. EcoMetrics3D is a plug-in for an open source, widely used 3D printing software called Cura. This sustainability plug-in helps users select manufacturing plans that lead to reduced environmental life cycle impacts. The plug-in provides data on the sustainability of a chosen plan based on printer information, part orientation, size, and complexity, and chosen process parameters based on user input, which includes uploading a CAD model and providing the rated power of the user’s 3D printer. When such settings are updated in Cura, the estimates automatically update in real-time. This plug-in provides a seamless way to estimate and improve the sustainability of 3D printing, allowing designers to compare environmental impacts associated with different CAD models, or helping 3D printing services improve the sustainability of their operation through selection of efficient process parameters. Currently, our tool estimates energy consumption only, although we have plans to include more of a holistic range of metrics by incorporating some basic life cycle assessment data. By designing this tool as a plug-in for Cura, we can leverage existing implementation of build time and material consumption estimates, reducing the amount of information that a user needs to manually enter. For example, the material density, print and bed temperature are automatically populated by pulling the values defined elsewhere in Cura, and the user only needs to enter the rated power of the printer.

Presenting Author: Hannah Budinoff University of Arizona

Presenting Author Biography: Dr. Hannah Budinoff is an Assistant Professor of Systems and Industrial Engineering at the University of Arizona. Her research interests include additive manufacturing, geometric manufacturability analysis, design for manufacturing, sustainable design, and engineering education. She completed her PhD in 2019 in mechanical engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, where she was awarded an NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.

Authors:

Hannah Budinoff University of Arizona
David Manford University of Arizona