Full Speed Ahead! Get Your Prints in Bronze, Stainless Steel, and High Detail Stainless Steel Faster Than Ever!
Bronze and Stainless Steel fans, listen up! These metals now ship out of our 3D printing factory faster than ever. i.materialise’s fastest Bronze lead time is down to only 10 business days, and those for Stainless Steel and High Detail Stainless Steel are down to 12 days. To benefit from our new, faster lead times, simply upload your design here and get an instant price quote.
Our new lead-times:
- Bronze ships in 10–14 business days instead of 13–15. Bronze is an alloy consisting primarily of copper. It is an affordable material for printing models in metal, strong, and has been used by mankind for ages. A polyurethane coating can be added and provides extra protection against tarnish.
- Stainless Steel ships in 12–16 business days instead of 15–20. Models made in Stainless Steel are printed in Stainless Steel powder that is infused with Bronze. Stainless Steel is the cheapest form of metal printing, very strong, and suitable for very large objects.
- High Detail Stainless Steel ships in 12–16 business days instead of 15–20. High Detail Stainless Steel delivers a significant level of detail and strength to your model, making it suitable for board game pieces, miniatures, key chains, jewelry, bolts and much more.
- We are constantly working on improving the lead times for all of our materials. Make sure to regularly browse our individual material pages to see recent improvements.
3D printed material samples: Bronze
Eagle Head Bottle Opener by Andrew Martin
Serpents Buckle by Michael Mueller
3D printed material samples: Stainless Steel
Saw Wrench by Pekka Salonkannel
Tiki Chess Pawn by Whystler
Kuip & Nanneke by Lukas van de Vrande
3D printed material samples: High Detail Stainless Steel
Aislin by Yarrid Henrard
High detail 3D print of a dragon
Technologies:
We use different technologies to print objects in each of these materials. For Bronze, first a wax cast of your item is 3D printed, which is then covered in a fine plaster. When the plaster solidifies, it is put in an oven to a point where the wax is completely burned out. The Bronze is then poured into the empty cast and your real 3D-printed Bronze item is created. In the final step, the item is polished and finished manually. Click here to find out more about the technological aspects of printing with Bronze.
With Stainless Steel, your part is created by binding together layers of Stainless Steel powder. A special print head moves back and forth over the layer and deposits a binding agent at specific points. Once the layer is finished and it has been dried via powerful overhead heaters, a new layer of powder is spread and the process begins again, layer by layer until the final piece is complete.
Once the printing is done, the Stainless Steel object is placed in a curing oven and your part is sintered. The extra powder that was not bound and is not part of your design is then removed. Finally your design is infused with Bronze, which replaces the binding agent. Your part is now solid metal and gets polished and finished in a final step. Click here to find out more about the technological aspects of printing with Stainless Steel.
For High Detail Stainless Steel, your object gets sintered in an oven at 1300°C. This can either be done in sand or on a ceramic plate. The sand is used most often because it’s suited for irregular designs or those that don’t have a flat base. The ceramic plate is used for more technical pieces with a flat base. After the cool-down process, the model is put into a mechanical polishing machine and then shipped to you. Click here to find out more about the technological aspects of printing with High Detail Stainless Steel.
Learn more about Bronze, Stainless Steel, and High Detail Stainless Steel on their individual material pages. Also check out our material news regarding the introduction of 18K Gold, White Rubber-Like material, and our Antique Silver finish.
