3D printing has now become commonplace to the point where it has expanded beyond its own initial hobby space.
While it took a bit longer for industrial 3D printing to permeate the various manufacturing landscapes, it is now seeing more and more use in various applications across different industries such as defense, packaging, and automotive.
Let's dive into the many use cases and applications 3D printing has introduced since its inception, explore where it might be headed, and see how UltiMaker fits into this evolving timeline of past, present, and future.
Dr. Hideo Kodama of the Nagoya Municipal Industrial Research Institute in Japan is often credited as the pioneer of 3D printing technology. In 1981, he published a paper demonstrating how photopolymers could be used to create solid 3D objects layer by layer, with each layer representing a cross-sectional slice of the intended design.
Although his concept wasn’t immediately applied in practice, Charles “Chuck” Hull later patented the stereolithography apparatus (SLA) and founded 3D Systems Corporation, which went on to release the first commercial 3D printer, the SLA-1.
SLA-1 vastly improved the prototyping capabilities in the automotive industry at the time as traditional injection molding for plastic part creation required a one-off tooling process that took 6 to 8 weeks which would further need to be refined in subsequent iterations that stretched mold making into a multiple-month process.
Two years later in 1988, we saw the advent of two more 3d printing technologies:
By the end of 1988, we had the 3 main technologies of 3D printing still in use today: SLA, FDM and SLS. However so far the applications were limited to manufacturing companies as at the time they carried a hefty price tag of around $300.000 with one of the more affordable models being the 3D Modeler that Stratasys sold for around $130.000.
The 90’s saw the first instances of 3D printing technologies challenging the traditional subtractive manufacturing methods such as casting, CNC milling and stamping, especially with the emergence of new CAD tools that allowed the creation of complex 3d models. Bioprinting was also gaining traction in the medical field and the entire additive manufacturing scene was on the verge of a new paradigm shift.
While another 3D printing technology emerged in 1997 developed by AeroMat which used high-powered lasers to fuse powdered titanium alloys(LAM - Laser Additive Manufacturing), the Wake Forest Institute of Regenerative Medicine was the first to 3D bioprint an organ(bladder) and also successfully transplant it in a human.
2005 saw the beginning of the RepRap project, initiated by Dr. Adrian Bowyer at the University of Bath which was the first open-source initiative that aimed to create a self-replicating 3D printer. This aimed to make the technology more accessible and affordable as all other 3D printing solutions available at the time were still proprietary.
Shortly after, in 2006 Fab@Home, led by students at Cornell University’s Department of Mechanical & Aerospace Engineering, joined RepRap in sparking the consumer 3D printing revolution with their Fab@Home Model 1 printer which was replicated and saw hundreds of units built across the world. Important to note that some of the design elements would later be found in later DIY printers, notably the first MakerBot Replicator in 2009.
Speaking of MakerBot, we have to mark 2008 as the year Thingiverse was launched by Zach Smith (a co-founder of MakerBot) which became the most widely known and largest repositories of open-source 3D models catering to hobbyists, educators, and professionals alike.
In 2009 the patent held by Stratasys for FDM expired, which caused the average FDM 3D printer price to drop from ~$10.000 to ~$1000 paving the way for affordable 3D printing for the wider crowd.
By 2011 printers had already seen a surge in the range of applications being used with the market now steadily expanding into the DIY hobbyist space the stage was set for widespread adoption. This year marked the first instance of a 3D printed unmanned aircraft made by the engineers at the University of Southampton showcasing the technology’s capabilities in aerospace applications, similarly, Urbee, the first 3D printed car was unveiled by Fabbaloo in Winnipeg.
Applications ranged from experimental confectionery with researchers at the University of Exeter developing a 3D printer capable of printing with chocolate to the first successful zero-gravity tests being completed by 3D Systems in partnership with Made in Space to demonstrate the feasibility of 3D printing in space environments.
We also have to note that this year marked the release of the first UltiMaker printer, the UltiMaker Original, a DIY kit featuring laser-cut wood components that allowed users to assemble and customize their 3D printer.
On the same note, the Cura slicer software was also first released in 2011, developed by David Braam it was initially intended to support Ultimaker’s 3D printers but over time evolved into one of the most widely used open-source slicers compatible with a variety of 3D printers.
In September 2013 the UltiMaker 2 was introduced as the company’s first out-of-the-box 3D printer, requiring minimal setup and single extrusion capabilities, it was targeted at home-users, schools, libraries, small businesses as well as industrial designers who wanted to leverage 3d printing for rapid prototyping and production.
The inclusion of a heated bed in the design also allowed it to print a wider range of materials like the relatively recently introduced PETG (late 2010s), Nylon, TPU and more.
This marked a pivotal change in the 3D printing landscape as the quality and precision offered were unmatched in the price range (~$2500 at launch) coupled UltiMaker’s commitment to open-source development, this appealed to a large community and fostered innovation and cemented the large scale adoption of 3D printers around the world.
In 2012 the distribution of DIY and consumer printers outpaced the sales of industrial printers for the first time marking the end of the Fab@Home project.
We’ve almost come full circle as the 3D printing scene started to loop back into the industrial application space. Due to the affordability and expanding range of materials available for 3D printing, the technology started seeing widespread use in various industrial applications beyond the prototyping core use case it was already used to.
The apparel industry has seen its first uses of 3D printing with fashion designers experimenting with various clothing articles and in commercial production Nike started using 3D printing to prototype and manufacture the 2012 Vapor Laser Talon football shoe for players of American football.
Even high fashion courtiers that designed for famous brands like Chanel worked with technology from Stratasys to employ 3D printing in their collections.
Handbag and jewelry manufacturing also saw successful and widespread adoption of 3D printing technology to create molds or even jewelry itself with its innate ability to quickly create customized models gaining favor among professionals in the industry.
For example, Florenradica, a design company based near Florence, Italy, fabricated prototypes and end-use parts for fashion houses.
The construction industry saw the first 3D-printed two-story house built in 45 days by Chinese company HuaShan Tengda in 2014. This marked the start of an exploration of 3D printing as a cost-effective construction method with Apis Cor 3D managing to print the structure of a 400-square-foot house in only 24 hours.
2015 saw Local Motors, an automotive manufacturing company, develop the LM3D Swim, a vehicle that was 80% 3D printed and Airbus announced that their Airbus A350 XWB included over 1000 3D printed components.
In the same year, a Royal Air Force Eurofighter Typhoon fighter jet flew with printed parts.
The UltiMaker 2+ 3D printer was launched in 2016 featuring an improved feeder system, interchangeable nozzles, and enhanced cooling for better print quality.
By now, some industry leaders like Siemens were already using UltiMaker printers in their manufacturing lines to reduce lead times on creating part molds and save up on costs.
Similar success stories with the UltiMaker 2+ printers see them being used to create smartphone retinal imaging adapters to help doctors diagnose eyesight problems or help with surgical planning by using 3D printed bone models.
Along with the UltiMaker 2+ the same year marked the debut of the new UltiMaker 3 which introduced dual extrusion capabilities and was compatible with more materials like PVA, PC, ABS and others.
One of the companies that took advantage of the expanded range of materials was Volkswagen Autoeuropa who switched to 3D printing as the main solution for creating custom tooling, jigs and fixtures for their car production lines.
2018 was turning point for UltiMaker as it partnered with material manufacturers DSM, BASF, DuPont Transportation & Advanced Polymers, Owens Corning, Mitsubishi, Henkel, Kuraray, Solvay, and Clariant to create new material profiles for printing high-level engineering plastics and composites.
This along with the launch of the brand new S series of printers debuting with the UltiMaker S5 developed for the professional market cemented the company’s new focus on the industrial sector and away from the hobbyist market.
We also have to note that 2018 marked the year that 3D printing became an everyday accessibility with low cost printers(~$200 price range) aimed at novice users, brought a renewed wave of interest into the 3D printing space.
Applications continued to evolve and in 2021 a British patient received the world’s first fully 3D-printed prosthetic eye, indicating advancements in personalized medical prosthetics, while in the same year advancements in construction saw Luyten 3D build the first code-compliant 3D-printed home in Melbourne, Australia.
In 2022 UltiMaker and MakerBot merged and leveraged the strengths of both brands to advance the adoption of additive manufacturing globally by providing a wider range of solutions from desktop 3D printers for education to professional-grade tools for businesses.
Building up on the success of the previous year, the UltiMaker S7, UltiMaker Method XL, and MakerBot Sketch were released in 2023 alongside new developments to Cura which now included settings for interlocking structure generation for dual extrusion as well as new high-performance composite materials like the easy-to-use PET CF.
By the end of 2024 UltiMaker’s solutions were utilized by customers like the Royal Netherlands Navy, Audi, Krones, hinting that the increased adoption of additive manufacturing technologies might be the way forward for a more sustainable, cost-efficient, better future.
So what are the next steps for 3D printing? In 2016 EY published their Global 3D Printing Report that assertively stated that 3D printing will become a game changer and described how 3D printing can become part of production in 3 ways: adopted as an additional technology in the existing production process, combined with traditional technologies in a form of hybrid technology or as a replacement for traditional methods.
And it looks like they were right, as regardless of the industry vertical we’re looking at, whether it’s manufacturing, packaging and automation, transportation, medical or defense, the ability to rapidly prototype and iterate parts, manufacture tooling and fixtures, create spare parts and more, are becoming deciding factors on whether businesses can remain competitive.
We firmly believe that 3D printing technologies will become an integral part of the future, both in education(for which we’ll reserve a separate article) and professional business sectors. The advantages are clear and we’ve specifically talked about the benefits of 3D printing in the past, such as in the automated packaging industry, manufacturing industry and we’re excited to see new applications come forth as adoption continues to grow.