[glitchinc]

What distinguishes the offerings from Fabric8Labs from the offerings from long-established companies like Desktop Metal[1] that are capable of printing parts using a wide range of materials including carbon steel, stainless steel, titanium, and tungsten?

The tungsten capability really throws me for a loop. As someone who TIG welds in my spare time, I can’t imagine having a machine in my shop that could make electrodes. The amount of energy required must be … a lot.

[1] https://www.desktopmetal.com/

[tbenst]

Fabric8Labs can print 100% density, whereas Desktop Metal is highly porous. Also Fabric8Labs can directly print pure copper, which has historically been very difficult. The process is also more energy efficient and better suited for small complex parts. Desktop Metal serves a different market in terms of material and size.

disclaimer: I'm a GP at Asimov Ventures and invested in Fabric8labs' pre-seed round.

[FrostKiwi]

Super interesting approach.

> "directly print pure copper, which has historically been very difficult"

SLM [1] has been able to 3D print Copper with precision down to the size of a mechanical pencil's lead for a long time already. In what way is ECAM better? Is it more precision + no need to handle powder + no need for laser source and containment - ECAM being slower, or am I missing some crucial feature?

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Selective_laser_melting

[dpain]

In general, the ECAM process is actually a highly energy efficient means of manufacturing especially when compared with other metal AM techniques that use either a laser or furnace to thermally process the material. Specifically, there's quite a lot of energy that goes into making the metal powders that is avoided as the input to the ECAM system is a precursor material several steps upstream of a typical refined metal.

[kragen]

in general electrolytic processes are very energy-intensive, and i'm sure fabric8labs's process is no exception

[FrostKiwi]

Interesting! Can you reference some numbers? Other processes such as SLM and DED require a powerful laser, starting from 3000W. When talking about copper specifically and especially when wanting higher processes speed, you need higher wavelength blue laser reaching 10000W of power. But on the flipside, the process can be quite quick. Non-laser alternatives like Metal Paste Deposition need a furnace, though I'm unsure of the power requirements there.

Any idea or references on how ECAM would compare to that?

[heisenbit]

Based on the graph the process is producing way less CO2 than other additive processes. Being low temperature this intuitively seems a credible claim. Maybe you are concerned about high currents which is true but since voltage is low that does not multiply to much.