A 25ft power patrol boat has been ‘printed’ by the University of Maine at its Advanced Structures and Composites Center in Orono, Maine. The event also unveiled the world’s largest polymer 3-D printer which is an astonishing six times larger than any 3-D printer before it.

The two-and-a-half ton boat, called 3Dirigo took just 72 hours to make over a three day period in September. Around 30 students were involved with academics and staff and the boat was designed by Navatek. After the launch it was tested in the Alfond W2 Ocean Engineering Laboratory, a marine model testing facility equipped with a high-performance wind machine and multidirectional wave basin.

The boat is part of a $20m research project in which the University collaborated with Oak Ridge National Laboratory and many other federal agencies. The printer itself is reported as costing $2.5m. It uses a polymer that is a mix of 50% wood fibres with heated liquid plastic – which is a technology that is envisaged to vastly speed up the time taken by 3-D printing machines. The new printer can be used to print objects as long as 100 feet by 22 feet wide by 10 feet high, and can print at 500 lbs in weight of materials per hour.

The project envisages many applications beyond boatbuilding and the hope is the manufacturing method will serve to increase sustainability, advance the future of biobased manufacturing and diversify the Maine forest products industry before rolling out technology to other areas.