Here's a copy of the Stratasys court filing:   http://www.scribd.com/doc/187032198/Stratasys-v-Microboards-Technology  (Hat tip:

3D Printing
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Here’s a copy of the Stratasys court filing: http://www.scribd.com/doc/187032198/Stratasys-v-Microboards-Technology (Hat tip: Peter Leppik)

They claim to own the heat controlled environment (http://www.google.com/patents/US5866058), the infill (http://www.google.com/patents/US5653925), the hot end (http://www.google.com/patents/US6004124), and the perimeter seam hiding (http://www.google.com/patents/US8349239).

I’m not so sure about the application of the '925 patent on infills, though. From my reading of the '925 patent, the description of the patent, including the included drawings, seems to be concentrated on controlling the gaps that form between the extruded material - the “porosity” - where the part is supposed to be solid. Although not specifically in the claim, the description talks about the ability of the part to out-gas through the part walls during molding. The described intent of the '925 does not seem to address the intent of variable infill percentages – as the infill parameter does not control the alignment of the extruder path of solid fills or perimeters. Now, a broad reading of claim 1 could support Stratasys’s position that infilll are “pores”. But it feels like a bit of a stretch.

The '058 patent is a fairly broad patent that, if I read correctly, lays the first claim (as I understand it) as: deposit “melted” plastic so that it’s still melted, have melted plastic build on top of a layer below and move the extruder to build the desired shape, and cool the “melted” plastic so that it solidifies. Additional claims basically says by controlling the temperatures around where the extrusion occurs, and controlling the temperature of the extruded plastic, you minimize part deformation. It doesn’t explicitly call out the heated bed, or a heated build chamber, but it broadly describes controlling the temperature of the extruded plastic and the areas surrounding where extrusion is happening. If this patent stands, it pretty much locks up FFF for a little while yet. '058 issued in 1997, so it should be expiring soon.

The '124 patent basically describes the hot end as we know it. The main claim is on the use of a hot-end for 3D printing - plastic goes in, gets heated up, and squirts out the other end. If it wasn’t narrowed to 3D printing, it probably would not have passed, as plastic welding tools (AFAIK) predates hotends for 3D printing. The following claims then goes into further details to protect increasingly more specific implementations.

The '239 seam hiding patent seems to be basically about lead-in/lead-out of the extrusion path. Like the '124, the claim is written to narrow the scope to 3D printing. It seems to me like there’s a chance someone could have used a G-code generator that did a lead-in/lead-out, used it for 3d printing – but whether that translates into demonstrable prior art is a whole other matter.

AFAIK, IMHO, IANAL. YMMV, et cetra. But my take from my (not quite so quick, but definitely not comprehensive) reading…

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Very interesting, thanks for that summary! Do you have any idea why they’re going after this company and not many others?

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Most likely because Afinia is a well financed threat – the parent company made lots of money selling DVD/CD duplicators - but that’s a shrinking market. AFAICT, they have been reallocating their resources to steer the company’s future in 3D printing. According to one person that I talked to, Afinia has bought their way into MakerFaire two years ago, and have been spending plenty of money advertising in Make Magazine. To the extent that Afinia is a well-established company with a well-established distribution and support system, they are a fare more likely threat to Makerbot and Stratasys’s market than most everyone else.

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Afina is small enough to ensure victory and large enough for everyone to notice and to set a precedent.

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Are these assholes bringing this up because they think they will win or because they want to make the other folk settle out of court? It seems to me that they just added a bunch of technical details to processes that have been around longer than they were around and that they think they can patent the whole damned 3d printing process period.

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Oh, the other thing about Afinia - they UL/FCC tested their product. Most (all?) of the smaller players have not. For government/educational/corporate purchasing departments, that could be a deal breaker. Hence another reason why Afinia is a threat.

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Ownership of the hotend and infill…I am afraid that if Stratasys wins, 3d Printing will be illegal in the USA unless you buy from them. That would just be F’d up.

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When discussing patents, ignore the descriptions, drawings etc. Focus only on the claims. That’s the meat.

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@Jan_Wildeboer - yes, the only thing that really matters in the patent are the claims - but the description can help inform the interpretation of the claims - and if the '925 was to be attacked, one could argue that Stratasys did not anticipate variable infill in the object (versus the variable porosity in the extrusion). Again, IMHO, IANAL.

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I believe that slic3r had the perimeter start/stop long before, and it was even discussed on reprap.Org before that.

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Well - I have been an anonymous supporter of EFF - throwing small amounts of cash in there direction when I could. But if the EFF will jump in on this and lend a hand - I will become a member at some level that I can afford.

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IMHO. Patents are difficult ooen to interpretation, but is also possible to define improvements. If fornexample variable filling done in porpouse is not specifically covered, it can be claimed as te core of your product. Then you cam avoid one patent, maybe.

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I was reading the '925 patent, and this is what it looks like to me…'925 is not even about the infill that we know. It is porosity. It is not empty regions and filled regions, it is about how squished the filament extrusion is. The idea that cylinders provide a roughly 26% gap if arranged in poorly arranged stacks, but it can be shrank to less gap if staggered. It is NOT about 20% infill or whatever as described in the picture.

On a side note, anyone notice that Stratasys waiting till 2 years from the expiration date of their “patents” to complain?

Personally, I think this stuff was all discussed on open forums before any patent and is most likely public property anyways.

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@NathanielStenzel , that’s the same conclusion I made, too. But the way the claim is worded, it’s a bit open to interpretation on whether it applies to infill. I think it’s a stretch, but that’s really up to the court to decide. And even without the '925, there are other 3 patents that can be used to keep Afinia from selling for a while.

Maybe SSYS/Makerbot was having a tough time getting channels to carry Makerbots because Afinia had already gotten an earlier footing? And this is their way of removing the Afinia from the channels (RadioShack, BestBuy, et cetra) ?

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Just take the trial to Texas and they are likely to win in a jury trial.

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@Joseph_Chiu I think that is exactly why they are pursuing these at this time, particularly as the Alfina product has a strong footing in Asia and Europe (in the guise of the UP!) - they are likely the #1 competitor for desktop sales with Makerbot. I’m interested to see if they fight the patents, for some reason I thought they had a Chinese parent company but Microboards appears to be US based.

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Afinia is not Up!, at least not exactly. I don’t know the exact nature of the relationship, but Afinia basically licensed the Up! design (and possibly buys complete hardware and software) from whatever upstream source of the Up! is. The official US distributor for the Up! and Afinia are two different organizations.