Glimpses of 3D Printing in the 21st Century

Introduction

Additive manufacturing has developed rapidly and ceaselessly ever since being brought into the spotlight at the dawn of the 21st century. In the industrial landscape of the world, the influence of 3D printing has been felt in every corner. It is strongly rooted inside Industry 4.0's expanding presence as an essentially futuristic technology that addresses the flaws that conventional manufacturing processes have been battling for decades. Manufacturing and construction are changing at an alarming pace, and additive manufacturing plays an essential role in this transformation. In addition to innovative and sustainable processes, additive manufacturing has led to smarter machines, more efficient management, and more automated operations. With additive manufacturing, multiple layers of materials are sequentially deposited in layers to create three-dimensional objects (R.Keshavamurthy et. al. (2018)). The machine functions in accordance with the planned design that is fed in the form of an extensive digital layout. Rapid prototyping and forging intricate geometric things are the two main applications of additive manufacturing. Additive layer manufacturing and 3D printing are two more names for additive manufacturing.

The use of additive manufacturing technology for producing useful parts and goods has increased significantly during the past 20 years. Some standard thermoplastic materials such as polylactic acid (PLA) (Melnikova R et.al. (2014), Tran P et. al. (2017) Al., Tymrak B et.al. (2014)), acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS) (Sun Q et al. (2008)), polycarbonate (PC) (Garcia CR et.al. (2012)), and polyamide (PA) (Caulfield B et. al. (2007)), related to certain thermosetting materials utilised in additive manufacturing. Epoxy resins serve as thermosetting polymers, require heat or ultraviolet radiation to cure properly, they are not recommended for 3D printing. (Gu H et. al., (2016)). Different industries benefit from additive manufacturing in numerous ways. There is considerable potential for lightweight and complex cross-section areas like honeycomb cells to be manufactured using this technology in aerospace and automotive industries. Structural optimization and form finding of light weight structures. There are different parts in composite structures that contain cavities and angles for managing weight to strength ratios. To study the feasibility and functionality of complex structures, architects find it very convenient to model them (Wong KV- et.al. (2012)). Using the technology for 3D printing in museum exhibitions, artifact education, and artifact restoration can facilitate physical concept and visualization learning (Short DB (2015)). An evaluation of the mechanical properties and 3D printed scaffolds' biological properties made from tricalcium phosphate doped with silica and zinc oxide. The lack of strength and load bearing ability of polymer materials limits the application of 3D printing to conceptual prototype design and modelling. Pure polymers' practical applicability is limited by these drawbacks. Matrix and fillers have been added to 3D-printed polymers to improve their structural and functional properties, which is unachievable as a single component. Particles, fibres, and nanomaterials are incorporated into polymer matrix composites because they exhibit high mechanical and physical properties. Casting and moulding, as well as machining, were traditionally used to manufacture polymers and composites with complex geometries (Huang SH et. al. (2013)). Despite being well-organized, these procedures and approaches are unable to govern intricate inner systems. Contrarily, because the design is managed by software, additive manufacturing offers a platform for fabricating intricate geometries with little wastage of materials and excellent accuracy. By making manufacturing convenient and precise, AM technologies revolutionized manufacturing. 3D printing has attracted massive interest from researchers over the last three decades, which has led to a growing interest in new polymer printing techniques and methods. Polymer composites with enhanced desirable properties have achieved remarkable developments in 3D printing in recent years (Vijay Tambrallimath et. al. (2021)).