3 ms·
It doesn't work like that. It's like a match: put enough energy in, and it transitions to a new state. Put less than the activation energy in, and it doesn't.
by regularfry 8y ago
It doesn't work like that. It's like a match: put enough energy in, and it transitions to a new state. Put less than the activation energy in, and it doesn't. The energy you've put in will be lost as heat, but the resin is unchanged until it changes completely.
- IshKebab 8y agoThat can't be true, because then you would have to project light from lots of different angles into the resin all at the same time, rather than from one angle with rotation like they do here.
- _Microft 8y agoThere's a minimum amount of energy required for the process to happen. Below that, it can not. Above it, things can happen but how often depends on the intensity of the light. Increasing intensity will make it happen a lot more often. Some parts will receive far more light then others, making the polymerization progress far enough to actually build a solid object while the rest of the volume is illuminated little enough for the resin to basically stay liquid. (Remember that you need to shine into the container, therefore illuminating liquid that you do not actually want to polymerize but need to shine through to reach the material that should. A sort of collateral-damage if you like). The remaining liquid material is removed but will still contain partially polymerized material that's not grown large enough to actually behave like a solid.