Our companyABOUT 3rd AXIS

3rd Axis Pty Ltd is an advanced manufacturing company incorporated in Australia in January 2019.

Since January 2020 3rd Axis uses proprietary Lithoz GmbH LC 7500 LCM photo-polymerisation Additive Manufacturing technology for the direct printing of ceramic articles for applications such as dental and medical devices. This process uses high intensity LED lighting under precise computer control at an individual pixel level to selectively polymerise a layer of photo-sensitive slurry that contains a suspension of the ceramic powder of interest.

After 3D Printing the part, any excess slurry is cleaned from the parts then these are dried, baked in a finely controlled furnace to remove the polymerised slurry [binder] and then sintered at elevated temperatures to achieve full ceramic density. During this process some predictable shrinkage occurs as the parts densify.

The final properties and characteristics of the AM ceramic parts are generally equivalent or in many cases superior to traditional press and sinter ceramic production methods. The major advantage of course being that fully formed detailed parts are produced directly requiring no further processing like machining, cutting or finish grinding of the material blank.

The geometry and form of the parts possible with this technology far exceeds the limits of traditional subtractive ceramic processing in as much as the possibilities are only really limited by the imagination of the designer and the 3D CAD representation of that vision. Fine geometric features can be produced directly off the process. The ceramic AM process is also cost efficient as any uncured slurry material is recovered for reuse.

The 3rd Axis Research & Development operations are co-located with the University of Sydney Core Research Facilities’ Sydney Manufacturing Hub [SMH] at the Darlington Campus in Sydney. Current activities there concern 3D ceramic AM applications research, development and materials characterisation. This location enables a close co-operation and collaboration with the respective Core Research Facilities and also enables the University academic faculties and researchers to pursue fundamental ceramic AM research of their own with the 3rd Axis LC 7500 LCM equipment.

https://www.sydney.edu.au/research/facilities/sydney-manufacturing-hub.html