Joshua Bird has developed a way to automatically generate non-planar toolpaths for 3D printing models, creating the world’s first non-planar slicer.
The design starts with a tetrahedral mesh of the model, which is then processed to find the shortest path through the model from any given tetrahedron to the printing bed.
This generates a deformed mesh which can be sliced and printed to create the final object.
Non-planar 3D printing allows more complex objects to be printed without the need for extra structures such as support pins.
This technique could revolutionise 3D printing, bringing it closer to the “print anything, anywhere” ideal.
