The additive manufacturing startup Fortify has announced the launch of their CKMTM (Continuous Kinetic Mixing) system, which enables new functionality in printed photopolymers. CKM addresses industry challenges that have persisted for decades when processing filled resins.
Fortify’s new system meets the need for advanced material properties in 3D Printing. This news comes as Fortify grows into its new Boston headquarters with increased printing and manufacturing capacity. The company is preparing to ship machines to select customers this summer.
Developing Continuous Kinetic Mixing was an integral part of Fortify’s strategy. It will play a critical role in manufacturing functional parts, (…), We’re excited to incorporate this material handling module with our FluxprintTM process to solve the application challenges of our customers.”
-Josh Martin, CEO and Co-Founder of Fortify
Fiber and particle additives have been used to enhance polymer performance and functionality in the injection molding industry for decades. Fortify is the first company to implement these reinforcing additive manufactured techniques with photopolymers. CKM ensures that additives stay uniformly distributed throughout the material while mitigating sedimentation and aggregation. This system allows for the manufacturing of a new class of functional materials.
Our team takes a comprehensive approach to developing additive solutions, (…), In addition to advanced hardware and software systems, Fortify innovates within materials science to process viscous, heavily loaded polymers. This new class of material is well suited for high performance applications.”
-Josh Martin
The process incorporates additives to enhance mechanical performance (strength, stiffness, toughness, wear, and heat deflection temperature) as well as thermal and electrical properties. Fortify’s platform combines the scalability, resolution, and surface quality of photopolymers with the performance expectations of traditional high performance polymers.
Fortify has recently expanded their successful use cases to include metal injection molding. In this application, ceramic fibers are blended with resin to manufacture tooling that can withstand the extreme temperatures and pressures of the molding process.
For years our customers have been asking us for a better way to prototype parts with our production metal injection molding process. Speed, dimensional accuracy, and production intent processes are critical for our customer’s development efforts, (…), Fortify finally showed us a tooling solution that holds up to our MIM process, and checks all the boxes for our customers requirements.”
-Chris Aiello, Technical Sales Manager at Alpha Precision Group.
The additive manufactured composites.
“As our capabilities become known, we’re encouraged by the requests coming from the field,” said Ben Arnold, Vice President of Business Development at Fortify. “There is clear demand for filled systems and we invite industry to challenge us with their requirements.”
Fortify is gaining traction in several specialty applications in the electrical and communications industries. These proprietary use cases leverage Fortify’s ability to combine strength with tuneable dielectrics in complex shapes.
Material properties are a key factor driving adoption of Additive Manufacturing, (..), Fortify’s on-board mixing technology is an important step toward satisfying this need. This is a very exciting piece of technology that will open up significant applications across industries.”
-Ken Kisner, Global Head of Innovation, 3D Printing, Henkel Adhesive Technologies, founder of Molecule Corp
Fortify’s Digital Composite Manufacturing (DCM) platform is the industry’s first and only 3D printer to include onboard mixing (CKM) and magnetic alignment technology called Fluxprint. The Fortify team will begin shipping machines this summer to select partner locations.
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Yahoo Finance, New module opens applications for photopolymer additive manufacturing https://finance.yahoo.com/news/fortify-ckmtm-technology-enables-step-140000041.html?guccounter=1&guce_referrer=aHR0cHM6Ly93d3cuZ29vZ2xlLmNvbS8&guce_referrer_sig=AQAAAMuvOhTMFtJNID4RV9OFDiIZJ8VH1n0zNo_EGhbFMd8IRFOdzxEi_3EkxakxjDKgsamoFNinV05oONIlUm_7KWOEO48CdMyzhnl0_hxJqYtZdNLc9o3ykVz2Qiey-m3C-N5nY03r6qLGKoMhhbcvK_gb3nkIKqmIXIWvqzlNULp , published on Mar19 2020, re-edited and published by João Andrade on Mar27 2020;
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Tess Boissoneault, 3D Printing Media Network Fortify launches CKM material handling module https://www.3dprintingmedia.network/fortifys-ckmtm-technology-enables-step-change-in-3d-printed-materials/ , published on Mar19 2020, re-edited and published by João Andrade on Mar27 2020;
