The printer produced a 25-foot, 2 1/2-ton boat using material that’s a blend of plastic and wood cellulose.
The boat was named the 3Dirigo and christened when Sen. Susan Collins smashed a champagne bottle across its bow at a ceremony at the university’s Advanced Structures and Composites Center. A Guinness World Records adjudicator was on hand to certify three records: the world’s largest polymer 3-D printer, largest 3-D printed boat and largest solid 3-D printed item, according to statement about the event.
The printer was also used to make a tactical shelter for soldiers that was unveiled at the same ceremony.
The university announced in May that it was getting the huge printer, developed in a partnership between the university and the U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. Officials said using the plastic-cellulose blend as the printer’s material has the potential to boost the state’s wood products industry.
Habib Dagher, a professor of structural engineering at the university and executive director the composites center, said the university worked with local shipbuilders to develop the boat.
He said the printer can be used to make molds that the boatbuilders can use when they make yachts and other watercraft. He also said it set a world record as the largest boat ever produced by a 3-D printer and the previous record holder was a 40-foot rowboat.
The center also unveiled a mold that is being used to make girders that will be used in a bridge project in Hampden next summer.
The 3-D printed boat was to be placed in the university’s ocean simulator, where wave technology is tested.
©2019 the Portland Press Herald (Portland, Maine). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
