Badgemaster has produced a new reusable name badge for a high street retailer thanks to a rapid upscale in manufacture with Photocentric’s LCD 3D printing technology. The British-based badge manufacturer had produced a reusable name badge design, featuring a plastic (High Impact Polystyrene) injection molded back component, which was originally to be tooled and manufactured by a molding company. The lead time requested by the customer – to tie in with a major rebrand launch – did not allow time to have new tooling manufactured, leaving the new product in limbo. Photocentric was able to step in to supercharge manufacture and produce the required 30,000 components with its own printing farm of LC Magna 3D LCD printers within just three weeks.
“The original design concept for our badge product had been put on hold during the pandemic,” says Ian Bradbeer, managing director, Badgemaster. “Our customer then renewed its interest once the situation eased. However, the short lead time meant that tooling was impossible. As a proud ‘Made in Britain UK manufacturer’ ourselves, we were keen to look at Photocentric as another innovative UK manufacturer to provide a solution for us. Photocentric were responsive to Badgemaster’s requirements and were able to meet the volume requirements in a particularly short lead time.”
Badgemaster knew of Photocentric’s additive manufacturing capabilities, and had kept track of developments during the pandemic, when it built a large number of machines (a 3D printing farm) to manufacture components for face mask visors for the NHS and Care Homes. Badgemaster Managing Director Ian Bradbeer approached Photocentric to determine whether it could manufacture the name badge component to be able to satisfy its own customer’s demand on a very tight time schedule.
After successfully conducting product trials to determine whether the component could be manufactured using this process, Badgemaster placed an order for 30,000 components to be delivered to them over a three-week period. The component was manufactured using Photocentric’s 3D polymers on its LC Magna 3D printers in Peterborough. Whilst the components were more expensive than the equivalent injection moulded component, they were available at what was deemed to be a commercially acceptable premium (a factor of 2.5) and without the need to lay down an expensive injection mould tool.
“We were thrilled to assist Ian and the team at Badgemaster for this project in which our print farm was able to deliver a rapid turnaround of components at the quality required, with no tooling necessary,” says Sally Tipping, sales director, Photocentric. “Allowing our client to deliver for an important high street partner in a challenging timeframe is a great example of the strengths of additive manufacturing as a solution, and it emphasises the benefits of our LCD 3D technology.”
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About Photocentric
Photocentric is the inventor of LCD-based 3D printing, and an award-winning specialist resin and LCD printer manufacturer based in Cambridgeshire, UK and Arizona, USA. Building on its vision of enabling custom mass manufacture with its innovative 3D printing technologies using LCD screens, Photocentric’s large format LCD printer range includes Liquid Crystal Magna, which delivers significant speed, volume and cost savings to business around the world in a range of industries. Photocentric is a patent holder in visible light curing technologies and specialises in photopolymerisation, manufacturing an innovative range of photopolymer resins compatible with any printer operating from 355nm to 460mm.
For more information, visit https://photocentricgroup.com/.
About Badgemaster
30 years in the making, and Badgemaster is now proud to hold the title as the UK’s leading and largest British badge manufacturer. Established in 1992, Badgemaster has evolved considerably from its humble beginnings, organically growing to stand today as an industry leader, a dedicated multi-million pound badge making business. The company service over 30,000 customers with an estimated 5 million people going to work everyday wearing a Badgemaster name badge.
For more information, visit https://www.badgemaster.co.uk/.
