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FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
DSM Somos Contact: Melisa Lasell, Tel. +39 06 9865179 Fax. +39 06 9871694
Email. <melisa.lasell@probusinesstech.net
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September 16, 2004
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Valla s.a., based in Villeurbanne near Lyon in France, specialises in rapid tooling and prototype manufacture, primarily in the white goods, medical prosthesis and automotive markets. With over 40 years of experience, Valla capitalizes on its vast know-how to offer advanced product development and tooling solutions, in part based on ProtoFunctional® material technologies for stereolithography by DSM Somos.
Valla provides a complete service to its clients - design validation and models for photography, testing of design concepts with fully functional prototypes, and low volume production tooling. In 1995, the company purchased a SLA®250 machine, adding stereolithography (SL) to its rapid prototyping (RP) service offering. Valla initially switched the SL material originally installed in their SLA®250 to Somos 8110 resins in 1998, and soon after graduated to Somos 9110 resins, which provided Valla with a competitive edge in the demanding RP market.
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Sophisticated materials for a changing market demand
Patrick Valla, President Director General of Valla s.a., commented, “We could see great benefits in migrating to increasingly sophisticated materials for our SL applications. The flexibility offered by Somos 9110 resins made handling and finishing of SL parts far easier, as well as enabling us to offer fully functional models to our customers.”
Continuing with the policy of offering high grade ProtoFunctional® materials to its customers, Valla began offering Somos WaterShed™ in 2003 for the transparency and ABS like physical properties it provided. Patrick Valla explained, “This material is perfect for us, it looks and behaves much like ABS. Its clarity is ideal for many of our white goods prototypes.”
To continue this progress, Valla was looking for a premium grade white resin. They worked closely with DSM Somos engineers in Europe and the USA to specify the properties the new material required, and invested in a SLA® 5000 machine for the testing and development of the new resin. This collaborative effort resulted in the creation of Somos White™, with Valla being the first European company to work with it.
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Customer response
The reaction of Valla’s customers was excellent. “They particularly liked the look and feel of Somos White™, which accurately simulates the texture of the finished product. We used the new material, in combination with Somos WaterShed™, to construct the prototype for an electric iron for Calor, part of the SEB Group, which we exhibited at Euromold in Frankfurt,” said Patrick Valla. A further benefit highlighted by him is that Somos White™ has excellent machinability, opening up further opportunities for he or his customers to process on high speed machining centres parts made in the material.
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Production-grade prototypes in days
Valla has proprietary technology which, combined with the ProtoFunctional® capabilities of Somos materials, allows it to supply its customers with fully functional prototypes which can withstand high temperatures - up to 250°C - at a fraction of the cost involved in traditional methods. Normally this would require machining a prototype directly from high temperature grade plastic, or producing an aluminium mould which is then injected with suitable temperature resistant plastic - both very costly methods. Valla first uses its SLA machine to create a detailed and accurate model using Somos ProtoFunctional® resins. This model is then duplicated in Valla’s own high temperature resin, providing significant cost savings and enabling them to produce 5 complete parts in just 10 days, a difficult task for such a demanding application.
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Direct Manufacturing in ProtoFunctional® materials
In addition to traditional manufacturing techniques, Valla also carries out production of low volume parts directly in ProtoFunctional® SL resins. Somos White™ has proved invaluable as an ABS simulant, particularly for applications where the parts are exposed to liquids or high humidity or when snap fit functions are part of the specification. Patrick Valla added, “We have manufactured sets of elevator control buttons for people with special needs directly in Somos White™; it is ideal for small batches of detailed parts.” He concluded, “We have definitely reaped the rewards of incorporating advanced Somos materials into all levels of our business, enabling us to offer technically superior and cost effective solutions to our customers.”
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About Somos White™ and WaterShed™:
Somos White™ and WaterShed™ are part of the Somos ProtoFunctional® family of stereolithography resins. In addition to mechanical properties which allow the resins to be used as an ABS simulant, the materials’ specific chemistries produce exceptionally high photospeeds and minimize the “overcure” necessary when building parts. These advantages allow maximum drawing speeds from the stereolithography machine, while drawing upon only a fraction of normal milliwatt usage (less than 100 mW for a SLA®5000 machine, and less than 70mW for a SLA®3500 machine). The potential for significant increase of the laser’s lifetime can furthermore correspond to interesting cost reductions for the stereolithography machine owner.
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For further information on Valla s.a.:
47 rue Antoine PRIMAT 69100 VILLEURBANNE – FRANCE
Tél : +33-(0)4-7268-8688 -- Fax : 33-(0)4-7268-8689
web: www.valla.fr / email : valla@valla.fr
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About DSM Somos
DSM Somos is currently the world’s second largest materials supplier to the rapid prototyping industry, providing stereolithography liquids and selective laser sintering powders used for the creation of three-dimensional models and prototypes directly from digital data. Somos’ patented ProtoFunctional® materials are used by a variety of industries, including automotive, aerospace, medical and telecommunications. Somos' corporate office is located at: 2 Penn’s Way, New Castle, DE 19720, USA, Tel. +1-302-326-8100, Americas@dsmsomos.info . For more information on DSM Somos in Europe: Fax. +39 06 9871694, Europe@dsmsomos.info
DSM Somos is an unincorporated division of DSM Desotech—a world leader in the development of UV-curable materials—and a member of the global DSM family. More information about the companies can be found at www.dsmsomos.com and www.dsmdesotech.com.
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DSM
DSM is active worldwide in life science and nutritional products, performance materials and industrial chemicals. The company specializes in innovative products and services that help improve the quality of life and DSM products are currently used in a wide range of end markets and applications such as human and animal nutrition and health, cosmetics, pharmaceuticals, automotive and transport, coatings, housing and electrics & electronics (E&E). The group has annual sales (pro forma including the recent acquisition - renamed DSM Nutritional Products) of approximately EUR 8 billion and employs about 26,000 people around the world. Ranking among the global leaders in many of its fields, DSM is headquartered in the Netherlands, with locations in Europe, Asia and the Americas. More information about DSM can be found at www.dsm.com <http://www.dsm.com/>
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What is stereolithography?
Stereolithography (SL) permits the rapid creation of 3D pieces utilizing a computer-controlled laser that polymerizes light-sensitive resins. The process is highly precise and constructs the object in a series of "additive layers," providing the advantage of producing highly complex forms that are difficult or impossible to fabricate by machining or traditional molding techniques. The evolution of advanced SL materials offers the potential of moving stereolithography from prototyping into production.
DSM Somos ProtoComposites™ are resins reinforced with various materials, such as ceramics and glasses, to produce functional properties not possible using individual components. DSM Somos ProtoComposite materials are a result of a significant research and development program investigating the potential for ACT-SL™ (Advanced Composite Technology for StereoLithography).
DSM Somos ProtoFunctional® resins for stereolithography provide advanced technology to respond to the changing needs of new product development and industrial design. In 2003, DSM Somos announced ProtoTool™ ceramic-filled resins, the first member belonging to the new ACT-SL™ technology and the result of a significant research and development program. Traditional non-composite ProtoFunctional materials by DSM Somos satisfy a varying range of characteristics: transparency, superior humidity and heat resistance, and outstanding mechanical properties, replicating those of many production grade plastics such as polypropylene, polyethylene, ABS and PBT. Technical data on all Somos materials may be found at www.dsmsomos.com
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