Manufacturing a three-dimensional object
AssigneeHewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P.
InventorsAlex Veis, Esteve Comas Cespedes, Joaquim Brugue Garvi
Life of this patent
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Abstract
Certain examples described herein relate to manufacturing a three-dimensional object. In some cases, a layer of build material is formed. An array of heat sources is controlled to selectively heat a sub-region of the layer of build material. Each heat source is individually addressable in the array to emit radiation independently of any other heat source in the array. Each heat source comprises a light-emitting diode, LED. In some cases, a fusing agent is deposited onto at least a part of the heated sub-region. Energy is applied at least to the deposited fusing agent to enable fusing of build material to fabricate a layer of the three dimensional object.
Claims15
A method of fabricating a three dimensional object, the method comprising:
- forming a layer of build material;
- controlling an array of heat sources to selectively heat a sub-region of the layer of build material, each heat source being individually addressable in the array to emit radiation independently of any other heat source in the array, wherein each heat source comprises a light-emitting diode, LED;
- depositing a fusing agent onto at least a part of the heated sub-region;
- and
- applying energy at least to the deposited fusing agent to enable fusing of build material to fabricate a layer of the three dimensional object.
Additive manufacturing apparatus comprising:
- an array of light-emitting diodes, LEDs, the array comprising a plurality of array segments, each array segment being controllable independently of any other array segment;
- and
- a controller to:
- identify a portion of a layer of particulate material contained in a build area;
- select an array segment from the plurality of array segments on the basis of the identified portion;
- and
- cause activation of LEDs in the selected array segment to preheat at least the identified portion prior to deposition of a fusing agent onto the identified portion.
A non-transitory machine readable medium comprising instructions which, when loaded into memory and executed by a processor, cause the processor to:
- obtain data representative of a slice of a three-dimensional object to be manufactured;
- select, based on the obtained data representative of the slice, a group of ultraviolet light-emitting diodes, UV-LEDs, from a plurality of groups of UV-LEDs of an additive manufacturing system, each group in the plurality of groups being individually addressable independently of any other group in the plurality of groups;
- and
- generate a power control signal for the selected group of UV-LEDs to cause the selected group of UV-LEDs to preheat an area of a layer of build material prior to printing of a fusing agent onto at least a part of the preheated area.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.