Meltio offers new solutions to improve the reliability and use of its wire-laser metal 3D printer technology

Meltio announced on November 8 a “giant step” towards facilitating the use of its metal 3D printing solutions. The Meltio Horizon and the Laser Calibration Systems are two new innovations from the Spanish company.

Both technological solutions developed by Meltio’s engineering team are part of the company’s strategy to eliminate barriers that it says have in the past prevented metal additive manufacturing from having a significant presence in many industrial sectors. Meltio says it is the perfect partner for these industries.

Meltio CEO Ángel Llavero said: “We have developed the Meltio Horizon software and the Laser Calibration System with the aim of facilitating the use of Meltio’s metal 3D printing technology for industries around the world. It should be noted that metal additive manufacturing has historically been associated with complex and expensive software, limited to the use of very few people because it was very specialised.”

Speaking about what the new solutions can achieve, Llavero added: “At Meltio, with the launch of our new software, we facilitate and shorten the learning time for you to democratise metal 3D printing so that your software is accessible and easy to use for many different profiles within a company. The Laser Calibration System will give industrial companies a new tool to be able to work with guaranteed reliability in the creation of their metal parts.”

Meltio Horizon is a proprietary toolpath generator software that works with the company’s ‘plug-and-play’ metal 3D printer, the Meltio M450, with its own features and custom-developed Meltio print and material profiles included. The new software solution was designed to be used with the Meltio M450 laser wire metal deposition process. Meltio claims that its users had relied on third-party FFF slicers to prepare paths in order to use the M450.

All material-related settings can be made directly in the Meltio Historia software. This allows for full control and one profile. Meltio says that this also allows for more specialised printing profiles, with control of the laser and hot wire on a “per slicing feature” basis, instead of being set for the full part.

The Meltio M450 Metal 3D Printer is currently compatible with the Meltio H110 software.

The new Laser Calibration System is an accessory kit that will improve the reliability of the Meltio machines. The new system allows Meltio users to calibrate Meltio’s multi-laser deposition head accurately on all three of its metal 3D printing solutions.

The system is composed of a laser alignment cam that must be placed underneath the printhead. This allows for clear views of laser focus points. The camera is controlled with a handheld controller, which is included in the kit.

Meltio’s multi-laser metal 3-D printing technology uses six lasers to point to a mutual points to melt the welding wire. This wire is fed through the middle of the deposition head. The lasers produce a high concentration energy, known meltpool, that melts the metal feedstock. The result is that the welds beads can be stacked on top one another.

The alignment of each laser is crucial to the process. They must reach the exact spot where the energy is concentrated. Meltio states that laser alignment problems can lead to energy inefficiency, and 3D printed parts with defects. However, the camera makes it easy to follow the calibration process.

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