A 3D printing task packing algorithm based on rectangle packing in cloud manufacturing

Abstract

In Cloud Manufacturing environment, massive 3D Printing services in various types provide users with the ability of mass customization. The large number of 3D printing tasks bring more challenges on printing task scheduling to improve 3D printers’ utilization and thus saving time and materials. This paper establishes the model of 3D printing process in different types and figures out the existence of auxiliary processes. Aiming at decreasing the ratio of auxiliary process time consumption, this paper develops an algorithm derived from the rectangle packing problem to pack printing tasks whose model size are relatively small into one task and print them all in one 3D printing process. Experiments show that the ratio of auxiliary process time consumption significantly reduced by this algorithm.