The Upload

At Protolabs, we love giving back to our communities and have several corporate and employee programs that help further this mission. As a technology-enabled manufacturer, supporting STEM related programs and initiatives is important to us, and we’re proud to be able to do this through the Protolabs Foundation. In addition to the Foundation, we have a number of employee giving groups that coordinate monetary and donation drives throughout the year to give back to our local communities and the causes that matter most to our employees.

A newly machined metal part can end up with edges that are sharper than desired for the end user unless the design smooths or breaks those sharp edges. To create an edge break, the design should incorporate sloped or beveled edges and corners known as chamfers—or rounded ones called fillets.

We sat down with co-founder and COO, Ian Hillier, to chat about Hacksmith’s humble beginnings, its latest Hulkbuster project (which we were psyched to assist with for 3D-printed components), and what’s next for the creative crew.

When you hear the term “over-engineering,” you probably think about all of those overly complicated products we’ve all encountered that seem too complex relative to their intended use. The confusing shower faucet controls. The washer or dryer with a dizzying array of counter-intuitive buttons and settings. Your new car’s baffling audio setup. Well, you get the idea.

Thermoplastic elastomers come in a variety of formulations, and each is unique in its own way. That makes picking the right one an important task among many when you are designing your parts.

GD&T is an industry standard symbolic language used to communicate allowable geometric represents the evolution of the CTQ quality inspection process.

Finishing options for sheet metal vary depending on your needs. For instance, are you looking for an aesthetically pleasing part, a part that needs to withstand environmental challenges and wear, or are you testing overall functionality?

The National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) recently awarded us with a 2022 Leadership Award in the Collaborative Ecosystems category. This is the eighth straight year in which we’ve won a Leadership Award, including last year’s award for our sustainability efforts.

An in-depth comparison of two popular 3D printing technologies: stereolithography (SLA) and selective laser sinter (SLS).

It is not a question of if but rather when will the next black swan event hit the globalized supply chain. And it is critical that companies learn from the last couple of years and develop an agile supply chain network that delivers value, reduces risk, and is not just driven by cost.

1018 and 4140 steel are two popular material choices. Here are factors to consider when choosing between the two.

It’s no secret that 3D printing processes don’t produce injection molding-quality surface finishes right off the printer, but there is good news. Technologies exist to help, and there are new developments all the time.