Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “The NexD1: a Next-Generation 3d Printer”.
I’M mike sinisi executive editor for make magazine, and i’m here with ben from next dynamics, who are about to launch an exciting new 3d printer ben um thanks for coming into the office. Tell me all about this thing: well, yeah this uh. What you’re looking at is the basically the next one nex d1 and it’s made by nex dynamics. That’S our company, we’re based in berlin yeah. We decided to make a printer that basically can do electronics, printing, while also being capable of multi-material printing. That was the goal.
Super cool now this unlike uh normal fdm or resin-based printer. This is polyjet yeah. This is poorly jet, like you know, we can’t because it’s trademarked, we can’t use that term, obviously, but uh yeah. This is poli jet type, printing and uh. With this we’re able to print resin based stuff, you know resin based uh many many materials.
You know also third-party materials and uh yeah. We can also do conductive materials, that’s excellent! Now, um, i know it’s at the top here. You’Ve got three different, bins, um and – and so these are the cartridges um that uh, that that the different materials that will be printed um will use. Tell me about some of the different materials that are that you guys are working on um yeah. Well, we have uh, basically all sort of resins that have you know different uh characteristics in terms of transparency with transparency, we have full color, so you can actually mix colors as well.
You can do heart white, hard gray and all these different types of resins that you used to basically also use third-party resins, so we’re fully capable with other companies resins. If you want to use the dental material and stuff like that, and you know conductive resins, we basically have a partner with some people in germany that developed completely new conductive resins that are especially sort of made for us and we’re really glad to have that. Because it’s it’s given us the opportunity to print conductive material for really cheap.
So that’s uh and that’s the goal of the whole thing. That’S yeah! That’S what you guys were um. What you guys were were thinking about when you set out to develop and to build this thing exactly: electronics, yeah. We started with making electronics, basically uh ludwig. Our ceo he’s the brain behind all this. He wanted to make pcbs because he’s an engineer and he always always wanted dreamed of basically being able to print electronics right away.
So but then, when they started, they saw that they could do it. Resin, based and also print with other resins as well. And then we basically looked into developing our own printhead because, unlike other companies, we don’t buy it anywhere. It’S it’s not made by one of those big print print companies, so we actually developed it ourselves and uh. So now we have the parameters down to be able to print almost any any of these resin based materials and even the conductive ones, with uh sort of specialized nano particles that we have uh made for this yeah, and so this right here this is a calibration Print that you did this morning, yeah exactly yeah, that’s calibrated print base, arduino board, uh and just uh some some stripes of the material yeah. So these are the conductive traces.
Exactly yeah yeah, that’s conductive resin! Do you know what what um, what spec, how how narrow can you get the traces on this machine um we’re basically aiming for uh, 10 microns, so yeah? That’S that’s the big goal um we are currently developing. This is our fourth generation we’re currently developing the fifth generation, and we already have the new printheads down uh and we’re fine tuning calibrating and it’s looking pretty good to be able to uh aim for 10 microns. That’S great yeah and you can do multi-layer pcbs with this. Exactly and that’s the thing you cannot only do multi-layering, but you can basically do any 3d configuration, so that means you’re going to be able to do stuff.
That’S not been done before, so you could print a circuit board. That starts like this, and then it has a wall that comes up here, exactly yeah, i’m still printing the traces in there exactly yeah, that’s true yeah. It changes a lot yeah, it’s hard for me to wrap my mind around some of the things yeah it’s hard for us too. You know it’s really. It’S uh, it’s a really brand new thing and we’re really hoping to um. You know with this coming out on kickstarter: we are really hoping to get people into it and uh.
You know uh also get all sorts of ideas going. You know, because, with this there’s uh you know sort of limitations have been lifted off. You know with us. It’S gon na be pretty great. I think right now.
I know that uh, normal polyjet type, printers um they’re not cheap. What are you guys looking at with this? Well, because we developed the printouts ourselves and because we’ve partnered with uh lots of good friends in germany and lots of companies there we’re able to get it down uh to price point where we have the early bird kickstarter at 2, 500 uh dollars, that’s yeah! That’S like a fraction of what the industrial yeah machines of this type cost yeah, that’s true, because we have developed all the stuff by ourselves and we’re really uh streamlining the process of making these things and because it’s kickstarter, obviously you know we’re gon na aim to Go really really, though, with this, because we wan na basically be a reason for people to get into uh. 3D printing. You know we want to give them the ability to do like all the things that they’ve dreamed about and do it for a reasonable price. That’S great, that’s really! What’S the pricing like after the early birds yeah after the early year passes, so there’s going to be some iterations of early bird pricing and then, after that, we’re basically looking at five uh, five thousand yeah still really affordable. Now, how about um cartridges, consumables, yeah cartridges so uh at the moment we’re really cheap on those as well, because we also have our own resin made for us, especially for us, so we’re looking at a price of um, basically we’re making them uh 15 cartridge. Um get out of here yeah, but it’s obviously you know it’s.
It’S not quite sure what what uh kind of pricing that we’re gon na put on them. It’S gon na be different for all all the different types of materials, but base resin, basically is really cheap and also also the um. The support material is also going to be really cheap. Oh that’s, exciting! There’S a lot of fun stuff that i want to do now.
This is this: is the support material? It’S water, soluble, exactly that’s crumbles away, yeah! That’S it um yeah! Basically, if you know support material, you know it’s sort of a hassle to clean it up, and so we also got new support material that is really like highly water soluble. So it’s first of all, it’s really easy to crumble off and there’s no there’s no leftovers right, because it’s almost like a bit gelatinous, you know uh, but then also you know if you have uh interior spaces filled out with this, you can also really quickly dissolve This in in water, it’s it’s gon na wash away much much faster than most of the other support materials. So yeah we’re pretty excited about that as well. Yeah, very cool! I’M excited about this.
There’S there’s a lot of stuff, i’m starting to think about with it. Yeah, that’s great! Well, i appreciate you bringing it in. I love this huge screen on there, yeah yeah. It’S that’s that wasn’t one another goal make it really simple to use. You know so people yeah, you know, there’s there’s still a sort of blockage, sometimes with people, and we want to reach as many of them as possible to make to make them comprehend that they can do. You know so much things so many things with these machines.
Yeah, it’s going to be pretty great bed size, uh, that’s 20 by 20 by 20, centimeters so 200 by 200, um, 200 millimeters. I’M not sure it’s about eight by eight by eight, an inch yeah. Okay, it’s a good size bed! Yeah yeah! That’S that’s! Because! That’S also something we always looked at when using other printers. It’S so all these weird limitations, you know – and we wanted to have a nice size – that’s really usable for everyone, so you can do most of the things that you need to do right, yeah and so after the kickstarter wraps up uh.
Do you have a time frame in mind of when this will go to manufacturing and then start shipping from there yeah? We were looking at um, basically um, we’re finalizing or working on the fifth generation sort of and we’re basically already sort of streamlining the process towards mass manufacturing. So it’s going to be a while. Still it’s we’re still a bit unsure, but we’re looking at um yeah. Maybe a year or something like this, i’m not sure, okay, yeah um, it’s really i i can’t say for now, but it’s yeah.
It’S going to be kickstarter time frame, yeah, kickstarter time frame exactly you know. You know how it works, but we’re really uh giving our best. You know, because the thing is: we’ve already invested, like a lot of research, a lot of uh. You know um interactions with many other people to to bring like all these amazing features into this machine and then uh yeah.
Now we need to basically uh make it mass producible. That’S why we’re on kickstarter as well. You know, that’s that’s why we need to be there and you guys are manufacturing in germany exactly that’s true, so yeah, basically, there’s always trouble when you outsource and we have. We know these people that we’re working with really well uh. Our ceo is friends with all of them basically, and so it’s really reliable stuff happening there and it’s gon na be really good for them to to uh. You know partner with us and us to partner with them and churn out this amazing product.
It’S great as fast as possible, good! Well, i’m excited to see how it goes. Yeah! Good luck next week with the launch. Thank you thanks for coming in and showing this yeah yeah. Thank you very much. Yeah glad to be here. You .