The Ambient Reactive Extrusion technology is a new approach to additive manufacturing that delivers faster, stronger and more versatile printed parts than traditional thermoplastic printing techniques. The ARE AM approach uses agile, lightweight print heads to deposit polymer materials up to 100 times faster than traditional print systems, suitable for on-site rapid prototyping. Carefully designed reactive print materials create inter-layer covalent bonds, resulting in significantly stronger vertical strength and eliminating internal stresses and warping.
The combination of technologies enables rapid vertical builds and complex geometries and does not require the same thermal management strategies as slower, heavier machines, enabling more cost-effective, energy-efficient additive manufacturing.
The ORNL portion of the development team was led by Orlando Rios and included William Carter, Lonnie Love, Peter Lloyd and Brian Post.