Tescoma shapes new trends with help of Connex 3D printing system - Objet - #1

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At a Glance Company: Tescoma URL: www.tescoma.com/en Location: Zlin, Czech Republic Industry: Kitchen utensils for home and professional catering Challenges • Find a 3D printing system that enables printing of multiple materials with unique characteristics in one build process • Define a methodology for performing accurate testing of both design and ergonomic validation aspects of products • Create parts that can withstand real world physical and functional testing • Enable designers to perform concept modeling using multiple materials • Create detailed 3D models of new products to send to manufacturing partners as patterns for manufacturing Solution Connex™ 500 multi-material 3Dprinting system from Objet Geometries Results • Tescoma is able to print multi-material parts in a single build, in-house • Testers can physically interact with 3D product models and interfaces to validate design and ergonomic product characteristics • Parts are used for real-world physical and functional testing, standing up well to handling and use • Accurate 3D models are used by manufacturing partners as product patterns, reducing cost of errors • Smooth surface of 3D prototypes minimizes part grinding • Increased flexibility to use wide range of model materials – facilitates close simulation of almost any end product • Simultaneous printing of models with multiple materials enables designers to fully explore their creative ideas, resulting in more innovative products • Combination of in-house testing and significantly fewer post- production modifications saves time and cost Tescoma, a leading Czech company with a global customer base, focuses on creating truly original designs for its high-quality kitchen utensils. The best young Czech designers work with cutting-edge technologies to design Tescoma's products and all employees play an integral part in ensuring the products meet stringent quality and functional requirements. Tescoma's range of brand products includes more than 2,000 utensils for domestic and professional catering. These items are made of top quality traditional materials, including high-grade stainless steel, thick-wall porcelain, resistant plastics, highquality hardwoods, and contemporary materials such as heat-resistant silicone, transparent plastics and crystal. Many Tescoma products combine multiple materials to provide the ideal functional and ergonomic performance. The design and creation of such a wide range of products using multiple materials requires highly accurate concept modeling and functional testing. To facilitate the creation of detailed 3D prototypes for this purpose, Tescoma depends on the Connex500™ 3D printer system from Objet Geometries. Based on Objet's innovative, market-proven PolyJetMatrix™ Technology, this advanced printing system offers the unique ability to print parts and assemblies made of multiple materials, with different mechanical or physical properties, all in a single build. This cannot be done with any other RP technology and is difficult and expensive to do with tooling. "The ability to create multi-material models in a single build process allows our designers to fully explore creative ideas by simultaneously modeling and testing multiple variations of their designs," explains Pavel Skrivanek, design engineer at Tescoma."Moreover, with the Connex 3D printer, we can create our product models to combine parts with varied physical properties, such as rigid surfaces, soft surfaces and non-slip handles, so that our engineers can accurately test all ergonomic aspects of our products. And, all of this can now be done in-house, which means major time savings and only minor preproduction changes." Stepping up to multi-material jetting and high resolution parts The concept of 3D printing is not new to Tescoma as the company has been using a number of in-house 3D printers for several years. Recently, when Tescoma was looking for more advanced technology that could be used to create prototypes for concept modeling, packaging testing and final testing of multi-material products, it decided to purchase the Connex500 3D printer. Tescoma shapes new trends with help of Connex 3D printing system “Thanks to the accuracy of the 3D models printed on the Connex 3D printer, we have almost-real products in our hands which we test and use the same way as end products” Case Study Ladislav Skoda Chief Designer