Metal expansion kit for plastic printers

With a small, intuitive leap, Netherlands-based 3D printer manufacturer Ultimaker is providing a simple yet ingenious addition to its line of polymer printers, a metal expansion kit that enables thermoplastic 3D printers to print metal parts.

Founded in 2011, Ultimaker has been designing and building 3D printers during a time when the tech was all but nonexistent in the public eye. With its line of printers having survived a gamut of iterations and upgrades in the ensuing years, the company continues to stay ahead of the curve by adding a new feature that has surprisingly been missed by leading manufacturers.

The Ultimaker Metal Expansion Kit is explicitly designed to allow users of all the company's dedicated items, software features, and knowledge to produce metal parts from their plastic 3D printers.

"The Ultimaker Metal Expansion Kit is especially suitable for printing non-of-the-shelf parts such as tools, jigs and fixtures, replacement parts, functional prototypes and auxiliary components," said Product Manager at Ultimaker Andrea Gasperini. "The Kit provides access to a complete and validated 3D printing workflow on an open platform that offers competitive quality and lead times normally only accessible with full in-house metal fused filament fabrication (MFFF) solutions at a much higher total cost of ownership."

The technology is powered by Ultimaker Cura, a powerful and easy-to-use software optimized for all the company's 3D printers.

Additionally, everything needed to begin metal 3D printing, from parts preparation to post-processing services, is in the kit. This includes materials and a set of dedicated print cores to support both the metal filament and Ultimaker's Ultrafuse Support Layer.

In particular, the kit has been developed with the new Print Core DD 0.4, a highly wear-resistant core to print abrasive support materials. No permanent hardware modifications are needed as print cores and materials can be replaced like any other print core or filament.

"This unique all-in-one bundle by Ultimaker unlocks the Metal 3D printing on open desktop platforms like Ultimaker S5, makes MFFF more accessible and affordable," said Head of Metal Systems at BASF AM Firat Hizal. "With all the necessary components and accessories in the kit, it facilitates for users switching between printing plastics and metal parts back-to-back, and helps them throughout the process step by step from a to z."

The launch of the Ultimaker Metal Expansion Kit is accompanied by the release of an MFFF dedicated Ultimaker Cura 5.1 version that brings the extensive set of features needed to prepare metal parts on the Ultimaker Platform.

In addition to the full suite of tools available as part of the Kit and software provided by Ultimaker, end-users gain access to exclusive Ultimaker 3D Printing Academy content to rely on a centralized and up-to-date knowledge base to teach the full workflow with all kinds of tips and tricks so anyone can successfully apply MFFF on the Ultimaker platform.