Arevo 3d printer

AREVO raises $25M, completes world’s largest continuous carbon fiber composite AM facility

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Additive manufacturing composites company AREVO has completed the construction of what is reportedly the world’s largest continuous carbon fiber composite additive manufacturing facility.

Equipped with 70 of the firm’s shipping container-sized Aqua 2 3D printers, the facility will aid AREVO in 3D printing continuous composite parts for bicycles, e-bikes, e-scooters, and other consumer products.

The company has also recently closed a $25 million financing round led by Khosla Ventures and with new participation from venture capital firm Founders Fund.

“After introducing Aqua 2 last year (4x faster than Aqua 1), we focused on producing and operating these systems at scale,” said Sonny Vu, CEO of AREVO. “Now with a total of 76 systems cloud connected and operating at our various locations, we have completed our first phase of industrializing.

“Now, AREVO is well-positioned for growth and can handle demands for both the company’s own consumer product brands as well as needs from our B2B customers.”

AREVO’s Aqua 2 3D printer (pictured) is reportedly able to print four times faster than its predecessor. Photo via AREVO.

AREVO’s carbon fiber 3D printing technology

Known for its continuous carbon fiber 3D printing technology, AREVO was founded in 2014 in Silicon Valley. The firm initially released a range of FFF/FDM composites claimed to be five times stronger than titanium, and has since developed an advanced 3D printing software and systems portfolio.

In 2015, AREVO created its scalable Robot-based Additive Manufacturing (RAM) platform, based on its Finite Element Analysis toolpath optimization program, to optimize the strength and appearance of 3D printed parts.

Having been in development for six years, the company’s continuous carbon fiber technology is protected by more than 80 patents. In the past, the technology has been leveraged to 3D print bike frames for Californian manufacturer Franco Bicycles in order to reduce the lead times, and for California-based start-up Superstrata’s upcoming e-bikes to eliminate the need for gluing or welding.

Earlier this year, AREVO partnered with award-winning studio Branch Creative to design and print the ‘Scotsman’ electric scooter, featuring a unified carbon fiber composite frame, handlebar and stem.

AREVO has used its Aqua 2 3D printer to produce unified composite bike frames with start-up Superstrata. Photo via Superstrata.

AREVO’s new 3D printing facility

The firm has now completed the construction of its new continuous fiber composite additive manufacturing facility, what it claims is the world’s largest. The center hosts a range of production systems, including 70 of its Aqua 2 systems which were unveiled last year.

Focused on printing large-format continuous carbon fiber parts, the Aqua 2 is designed to be a high-speed machine capable of printing up to one cubic meter in size. The machine can print up to four times faster than its predecessor, making it suitable for rapidly creating on-demand custom parts. The Aqua 2 systems have been utilized to 3D print bike frames, sports equipment, automotive parts, aerospace components, and architectural structures.

Now that the company has completed its new facility, it will start to deliver on 3D printing continuous composite parts for Superstrata’s bikes and e-bikes, and complete the product engineering for Scotsman’s e-scooters. The company hinted it is also set to launch a third consumer product shortly.

In addition to the completion of its new facility, AREVO has raised $25 million in its most recent financing round. The round was led by Khosla Ventures and saw participation from Founders Fund, GGVC, Alabaster and Defy.

AREVO has gained the backing of numerous investors over the years, raising $7 million in 2016 to expand its operations and begin developing strong, lightweight parts for use in production applications. Later, in 2018 the firm closed a $12.5 million Series B funding round to bolster its ongoing R&D efforts. The firm concluded a further $25 million funding round alongside the launch of its Aqua 2 3D printer, which it has used to further the development of its carbon fiber 3D printing technology.

AREVO’s latest funding round will bring the total money raised by the company to $85 million, and will be used to hire new engineers and support its operations.

“We are growing the team and are looking for some key engineers (mechanical, laser/optics, electrical) in the US and Vietnam to join us,” Vu added.

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Featured image shows AREVO’s Aqua 2 3D printer (pictured) is reportedly able to print four times faster than its predecessor. Photo via AREVO.

Tags Alabaster arevo Arevo aqua 2 Branch Creative Defy Partners Founders Fund Franco Bicycles GGVC Khosla Ventures Scotsman e-scooter Sonny Vu Superstrata

Hayley Everett

Hayley is a Technology Journalist for 3DPI and has a background in B2B publications spanning manufacturing, tools and cycling. Writing news and features, she holds a keen interest in emerging technologies which are impacting the world we live in.

AREVO launches world's first high-speed AM composite system

Published on August 11, 2020 by Carlota V.

AREVO, a young Californian company, is known for having developed an additive manufacturing platform to transform composites production in the AM sector. As you may know, composites represent a growing segment in this industry, and have started competing with some metal AM processes as they offer interesting properties for some overlapping applications in sectors like aerospace. In order to continue the transformation of this segment, AREVO has announced the introduction of a new system, the Aqua 2. The company states that it represents the world’s first high speed system for large continuous carbon fibre composite 3D printing. In addition, AREVO has closed its Series B funding round and raised $25M, which brings their total funding to $60M.

Led by Defy Partners and GGV Capital, Trae Vassallo, founding partner at Defy Partners states: “AREVO’s new platform enables fabrication of high strength, low weight carbon fibre parts, currently not possible with today’s standard techniques. We are thrilled to be working with the team to scale up this incredibly impactful technology.” In fact, the Aqua 2 is said to be able to print 4x faster than its predecessor, enabling the on-demand production of up to one cubic meter custom composite parts.

AREVO: scaling up composite 3D printing

It is no surprise that continuous composite 3D printing is gaining such popularity. After speaking with Sonny Vu, CEO of AREVO, he explained to us that such a solution makes sense anytime you need a part that is very strong but light, especially when it’s too geometrically complex for the traditional laminate approach to fabricate. He adds: “Also, useful when you need something fast, say in a few hours, and can’t wait 18 months for someone to make a mold and set up a manufacturing line for you. Also, it’s especially useful for situations when you don’t know how many parts you will need and can only order a few at a time.”

The Aqua 2 aims to deliver on build volume, speed and quality. “We can deliver on aerospace grade quality not just industrial or consumer grade quality, that’s why we have Airbus as an investor,” comments Vu. Aqua 2 also delivers on speed which is paramount to successful scaling up, and further down the line, mass production. “The key to being able to print tens of thousands of frames a year is scaling up. That’s why we are building one of the world’s largest, if not the largest, carbon fiber composite additive manufacturing facilities in the world starting this fall.”

These announcements come on the heels of Arevo’s crowdfunding campaign, which we reported on recently, to make their first direct-to-consumer products: the Superstrata bicycle and e-bicycle (the world’s first true unibody custom 3D printed carbon fiber bikes). The campaign hit its goal of $100k in under 3 minutes after launch, and is now on track to surpass $5m from over 3000 backers.

You can find more information about AREVO’s new system and funding round HERE. What do you think of these announcements? Let us know in a comment below or on our Facebook and Twitter pages! Don’t forget to sign up for our free weekly Newsletter, with all the latest news in 3D printing delivered straight to your inbox! You can find the #3Dstartup interview HERE.

Arevo Announces New Reinforced Resin 3D Printer, Plans to Build Massive Additive Factory

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relying on laser deposition of continuous fiber-reinforced structural thermoplastic filament and announced its intention to launch large-scale additive manufacturing of custom composite products. We talk about the essence of the development and ambitious plans. nine0003

The new system, called the Aqua 2, is more productive, printing about four times faster than the original model. The working volume of the additive plant reaches one cubic meter. The announcement of the new 3D printer served as the starting point for an investment round B, which added another twenty-five million dollars to the company's piggy bank, to a total investment of around $60 million. There are other sources of funding: the company is already operating in the commercial market, offering 3D printing services. printing products from composite materials for the construction industry, aerospace, heavy industry, consumer goods manufacturers. In general, everyone who has the desire and money. nine0003

In July of this year, the startup launched a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo to accept orders for two variants of Superstrata bikes, regular and electric assisted, with customizable frames to fit the body shape of individual users. The startup broke the $100,000 mark in less than three minutes, and it currently exceeds $4 million with more than 2,500 customers. The frames are supposed to be produced on additive plants of our own design, printing with polymers with a high content of continuous reinforcing fiber. But let's take a look at the essence of development. nine0003

Reinforced thermoplastic 3D printing has been on the rise for several years and is available in both the industrial and desktop segments. Some of the most impressive industrial options include Cincinnati Incorporated's BAAM (Big Area Additive Manufacturing, pictured below) large-format additive manufacturing plants used by Local Motors in the production of composite car bodies, and the LSAM (Large Scale Additive Manufacturing) family of hybrid additive-subtractive systems for by Thermwood Corporation. Such equipment uses polymer and composite granules to increase productivity, but a growing range of carbon and glass-filled filaments based on different polymers is available to owners of desktop 3D printers. nine0003

Although such composite materials offer an increase in physical and mechanical properties, the benefit is limited to the use of short fibers. The full potential can only be realized when using a continuous reinforcing fiber, and such additive systems also exist: the desktop segment is represented by at least two manufacturers - the American Markforged and the Russian-Luxembourg Anisoprint (pictured below). More exotic options include the Italian +Lab team's CFCSM (Continuous Fiber Composites Smart Manufacturing) technology using photopolymers and thermosets, but that's another story. nine0003

It would seem that everything has already been invented, but no. There are some interesting things in the development of Arevo. Like many industrial additive systems, Aqua family 3D printers use multi-axis robotic arms as a positioning system, but the material application method is fundamentally different from extrusion systems that print with filaments and granules. A filament is also used here, but melting is carried out not by a hot end with a heating element, but by a laser emitter, due to which both high performance and reliability are achieved - since there is no extruder, you don’t have to worry about clogging and wear of the nozzle, and the proportion of reinforcing fiber in the filament can be build up. Obviously, this is not enough for a dense stacking of layers, so the melt is pressed by a roller, which presses the material into the cavities and provides a specific density of more than 9nine%.

But that's not all. The high power-to-weight ratio of the system allows it to work with refractory structural thermoplastics, so the standard consumable material is polyether ether ketone (PEEK, PEEK) prepreg filament with 50% continuous carbon fiber. Finally, the use of a multi-axis manipulator allows overlapping layers with a high degree of freedom, thereby increasing isotropy and more evenly distributing the strength of products in different directions of loading. nine0003

Section of a typical filament used by Arevo additive systems

According to the data presented, the mechanical performance of the tested 3D printed samples with unidirectional fiber laying significantly exceeds those of the FDM 3D printed samples made of nylon with 35% chopped carbon fiber: more than fourteen times in modulus of elasticity and more than twenty-two times the tensile strength. When compared to autoclaved PEEK CFRP specimens with equivalent carbon content, Arevo's raw 3D printed products lose about 30% in tensile and compressive strength at a nearly equivalent elastic modulus, and this is a very good result. A report detailing the tests is available at this link. nine0003

So far, Arevo has been reluctant to offer additive systems for sale, preferring to monetize developments through the production of 3D printed goods and components. The company's plans are ambitious: at the beginning of the summer, Arevo announced its intention to create a facility for rapid additive manufacturing of complex geometrical composite products to order with "hundreds of production systems in the center of an as-yet unannounced Asian city. " The second generation additive system will serve as the basis of the project. nine0003

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following the launch of the first 3D printed off-road city bike.

AREVO technology is a combination of 3D printing and web applications, robotics, machine learning and innovative thermoplastics. For the manufacture of parts, the company uses a “material feed head” located on a mechanical manipulator - such a system allows you to print three-dimensional structures in any axes. In this way, layers can be laid out in any direction, creating parts of almost unlimited dimensions. That is why the AREVO eBike can be changed according to the client's wishes. In addition, bicycles are made from carbon-fiber thermoplastic, a material that is five times stronger and three times lighter than titanium, according to the developers. nine0003

Together with the German manufacturer Oechsler, the AREVO team uses the Drivematic automatic gearbox for a 3D printed electric bike. The novelty has a number of unique features - the model is ideal for residents of modern cities who ride a bicycle to work and study. Among other things, the eBike has a Bluetooth connection and a smartphone app that allows you to track data such as battery charge, current speed and distance traveled. nine0003

Oechsler says the joint project with AREVO is a unique opportunity to test the integrated system, and 3D printed bicycle frames are a great way to speed up production and meet demand with greener technology.

Tags: 3d printing, digital fabrication, Idea, Material, Models, Design

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