Rapid Prototyping and Manufacturing

Rapid Prototyping

Dr. Denis Cormier - Research group director; Associate Professor of Industrial Engineering

Send e-mail to Denis Cormier if you have any questions about the RP facilities at NC State

Dr. Ola Harrysson - Assistant Professor of Industrial Engineering

Dr. Harvey West - Materials scientist and testing engineer with the FMMC

Mr. Jason Low - Laboratory Manager

Ms. Sasitorn (Gail) Srisiwadi - PhD student working on rapid tooling for electrochemical machining

Mr. Tushar Mahale - PhD student working on development of new materials for the Electron Beam Melting process

Ms. Molly Purser - PhD student working on design of an annuloplasty ring for minimally invasive cardiac surgery

Mr. Omer Cansizoglu- PhD student working on design custom hip stems

Mr. Kent Marshall - IMSEI student working on just about everything

	Arcam S12 Electron Beam Melting (EBM) Machine - directly produces fully dense metal parts with complex geometric shapes that include undercuts and down-facing surfaces.
	3D Systems SLA 190 - produces epoxy resin parts.
	Dimension SST - produces ABS plastic parts using fused deposition modeling
	Z-Corp - produces plaster parts using the 3D printing process.
	Solidscape ModelMaker II - produces very accurate thermoplastic parts with fine surface finish.

	SolidWorks - the bulk of our modeling is done with SolidWorks. Students us SW to model core and cavity inserts, core pins, EDM electrodes, etc.
	SurfCAM - 3-5 axis CNC toolpath generation.
	Moldflow Plastics Advisor Series - Students use this software to evaluate and modify their mold designs as needed to ensure proper filling and to minimize warpage and sinks.
	AutoCAD - is available on the campus-wide computing network
	Revworks - used with a Microscribe arm to reverse engineer parts into fully editable feature-based CAD models
	Geomagic Studio - used with our reverse engineering equipment to convert point clouds into editable CAD models
	Magics (Materialise) - used to automatically design molds and tooling from STL part files
	Mimics (Materialise) - used to convert CT and MRI medical scan data into STL files

Plastics Processing Equipment

	Morgan Press - small injection molding machine. Students use MUD mold bases with this machine
	Dopag meter mix dispensing machine - for injecting Renshape polyurethane into RTV silicone ruber molds
	Emco Benchtop Injection Molding Machine
	Benchtop Vacuum Forming Machine
	Benchtop Rotation Molding Machine
	Vacuum degassing chamber for RTV mold making and polyurethane casting

Metal Casting Equipment

	Dentaurum Autocast titanium vacuum investment casting machine - we cast intricate titanium parts with sub-millimeter size features using patterns made on an InVision HR prototyping machine
	DTI Die Casting Machine - a zinc die caster
	Conquest Industries Spin Casting Machine and Vulcanizing Press - using high temperature rubber and RP patterns, students can spin cast zinc parts a few hours after the patterns come out of the RP machine.
	Investment Casting Burnout Furnace - used for ordinary vacuum investment casting of non-ferrous metals, or used with the Dentaurum titanium caster mentioned above.

Powder Processing Equipment

	Thermolyne high temperature sintering furnace with controlled atmosphere
	Tox Presses for powder compaction

CNC Machining Equipment

	Students use SurfCAM to generate toolpaths from their SolidWorks solid models.
	Shoda 5-Axis CNC Router
	Cincinnati Milacron 21 Station 4-Axis CNC Vertical Machining Center (Arrow) with rotary table
	Cincinnati Milacron CNC Turning Center (Hawk)
	Benchman 3-axis CNC machine with tool changer
	MAXNC 4-axis benchtop CNC milling machine with reverse engineering probe

EDM

Charmilles sinker EDM machine for making die cast and injection molding core and cavity inserts

	RTV Silicone Rubber Molds - for polyurethane castings, students routinely prototype part patterns around which RTV silicone molds are built.
	High Temperature Vulcanized Rubber Molds - when metal castings are needed, we have students create high temperature vulcanized rubber molds that are capable of withstanding temperatures approaching 1000F. They typically cast small zinc parts into these molds, but polyurethane and (much more expensive) lead-free pewter are also occasionally cast as well.

	Roland LPX-250 laser scanner for non-contact reverse engineering
	MicroScribe - articulating arm for reverse engineering
	Brown & Sharpe MicroVal - coordinate measuring machine with touch probe
	Mititoyo Surface Profilometer - for measuring surface roughness