If you know me you know I like two things: sausage and 3D printers. While I primarily use FDM printers like Makerbot at home, I do love the quality and coherence of SLA – stereolithographic – machines. This new one, the Pegasus Touch Laser, is similar to the Form One in that it uses an inexpensive UV-cured resin to build surprisingly detailed models using laser light and a little elbow grease.
This model improves upon the average 3D printer in a few ways. First, it has a nice 7x7x9 inch build envelope and supports multiple colors of resin. It also has a built-in minicomputer and LCD that you can use to control the print as it comes out. Writes the Las Vegas-based team:
Other low cost printers transfer several gigabytes of post processed data from a tethered PC. Pegasus Touch has an on-board Linux computer that can do much of the 3D processing computation on the printer itself. Typical transfer file sizes are only a few megabytes so it never needs to be tethered to another computer.
You can see the Pegasus in action over here and you pledge $2,000 to get your own printer. It’s a slightly faster print as well thanks to the group’s efforts to build a 3000mm/sec laser path. And, unlike the Form One, the Pegasus uses more logical and less obtrusive supports as it rises out of the resin bath. It will sell for $3,499 after the initial Kickstarter run.
The company calls this a sub-$2,000 SLA printer which isn’t quite true. However, given that the closest competitor goes for $3,299.00 the price is just about right for a powerful SLA machine. While I still think FDM is great for beginners and hobbyists, a nice resin-based laser printer makes me all warm and resiny inside.
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