Matthew Harrison - Mar 15 2018

Introducing Gyroid Infill

3D printed gyroid infill with three different densities

When it comes to infill patterns, they're all pretty plain. Grid, rectilinear, honeycomb and cubic. I know there are others, but those 4 are favoured due to their strength and ability to be printed at high speeds. Well now there's a new kid on the block - Gyroid.

A gyroid is a naturally occurring structure which be found in butterfly wings and even within membranes inside cells. In 2017, MIT researchers discovered that when graphene was shaped into a gyroid structure, it had exceptional strength properties at low densities. They then discovered however, that the crucial aspect of this was actually the gyroid structure itself, and that other materials such as plastic could benefit from this.

Pink and grey spheres and cubes printed with the gyroid pattern

Slic3r developer supermerill started working on this, and it's now been merged into both the regular Slic3r and also Prusa edition. You can download a version of Slic3r with gyroid infill here, and it'll be in the next Prusa edition release.

I'll be doing some strength tests with the gyroid infill soon to see how it compares to the other patterns. For now though, here are some gorgeous prints that I did with the gyroid infill showing:

Blue cylinder printed with gyroid infill showing light shine through
Yellow 3D printed vase combining solid parts and exposed gyroid infill

Stay tuned for the strength tests and more videos on Gyroid to come! And be sure to subscribe to my YouTube channel here if you'd like to see more content like this.

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