Colossus introduces the world’s largest transportable FGF 3D printer to the public at Formnext
Colossus, a multinational startup based in Genk, Belgium, will be introducing the world’s first fully integrated transportable 3D printing system at Formnext this month. The Colossus 3D printer is the first system designed with a special accent on materials for furniture, construction applications and large size 3D objects. It also prints with recycled materials, combining cutting-edge technology to give plastics a second life.
With a size of 2,67m x 1m x 1,5m (LxWxH) and a build volume of 4m3, the printer will support impressive print speeds of up to 15kg per hour. It comes fully equipped with a granulate fed extruder print head and a dehumidification unit for better print quality. The heated print bed features a liquid heated bed for easy print removal. Out of the many recycled and non-recycled material options that can be used with this printer, Thanks to its partnership with Mitsubishi chemical 10 material compound profiles have been pretested for optimal performance. It is the first printer of its scale to use rPET and rPP profiles.
Apart from its many functional advantages, the printer is entirely built for maximum flexibility in print production: it can be used as a transportable or fixed unit; the system is easy to add on and upgrade. “We wanted to build a printing system that really adjusts to our customer needs, so making it as transportable and upgradeable as possible was a main priority,” says Yannick Aerts, CTO of Colossus. Everything from print volume to output of extruder to heated bed will be configurable – even software add-ons and screw types. This flexibility makes the Colossal 3D FGF highly relevant for various applications and industry sectors.
It also comes with an innovative logging software and remote internet debugging and connectivity system so that engineers can help fix problems remotely and in real time. Training, service and maintenance contracts will be provided to ensure that the machines run 24/7 as intended.
The vision behind this printer was twofold: to make a fast, cost-effective, platform to use 3D technology to give plastic waste a useful second life. The team learned firsthand that cost-effective printers of this size are hard to find. The same is true for flexible manufacturing partners across industries. “Young designers often lack partners to realize their ideas due to the high entry barriers in this market. Clients also requested a way to make furniture and other large-scale objects from plastic waste, so we searched the market and a large-scale printer and everything we found was either too slow, too expensive, or could not work with high-temperature materials like rPET or CarbonP which are difficult to extrude”, says Philippe Mérillet, co-founder of Colossus “So we decided to develop a printer that would do just that a made for materials.”
After the introduction of the first Colossus 3D FGF Colossus printer, the team has planned to build and improve on the first Colossus design. With a first prototype available, further research is currently underway to build a multi-head system, a higher print output of up to 25kg per hour, improved retraction and many other features. The printer is already available for pre-order.