Color Slicing Algorithm Development Of3D Color Printing System And Its Experimental Research

Rapid Prototyping (RP) technology is a new kind of manufacturing method based on dispersion/deposition. With the aid of computer、 laser、 binder material droplet jetting、precise transmission control system and integrated with CAD/CAM, it can turn a3D model into a real product. It can meet modern manufacturing’s requirements with its advantages of high speed, cost effective and wide applications. Three Dimensional Printing(3DP), which is one aspect of Rapid Prototyping, also has those advantages.In rapid prototyping area, STL (Stereo lithographic) file format, which was created by American3D System Corporation, was acknowledged to be the standard file format which is widely used in model presentation. It expresses surfaces of3D model with a series of triangles, likes a way of finite element mesh generation. But it never includes color information when it’s used to describe3D models. So it can’t be used for data transmission to realize color slicing in color3D printing system. As one of those formats which can be used to store3D models’information, however, VRML97can store color information effectively. Based on this characteristic, research chose this format as current data transmitting medium, color slicing was accomplished by extracting color information from VRML97files.In this research, Visual C++6.0was chose as basic platform of software system. The whole color slicing algorithm was accomplished with the help of MFC(Microsoft Fundamental Classes). The algorithm includes data-reading module, topological relationship building module, contour-finding module, contour-filling module and so on. Color slicing of3D model which includes single-part and multiple-part (assembly) was accomplished with this algorithm. In addition, some problems which generated during color slicing process were discussed in detail in this paper, including expressing of parallel surfaces and assembly slicing, and some solutions of these issues were also presented.VRML file format and the whole algorithm were introduced in great detail in this paper. The results of color slicing were tested by laboratory-designed3D printing system, through which color3D model was successfully printed. The minimum printing layer thickness of this system can reach0.09mm. Its printing speed can reach40s/layer with scale error within±0.2mm/40mm.