A Design of the Extrusion System for Chocolate 3D Printing

Abstract

Food 3D printing is one of the newest developments in food design and manufacturing with great potential in both food recipe and industrial processing. Chocolate 3D printing, especially, has received investment from big companies like Hersey and 3D System. Unlike the traditional production of customized food, which requires extensive skilled labor and a long process of molding, 3D printing food allows users to design the shape by editing the digital model file. However, there are problems with the current chocolate printers that need to improve to make them popular. The first problem is that price is too high for individual users and small stores. Most people could not afford a printer that is about several thousand dollars, not to mention the expensive printer-specific material. Another problem is the ability of the printer. Some printers can only produce few default shapes set by the producer, so users do not have much freedom to print the shapes they want. This limits the ability that is supposed to be the biggest advantage of the 3D printer. And one of the biggest weaknesses of the current chocolate 3D printers is that they cannot perform tempering, a critical process in chocolate production. Without chocolate tempering, the final product chocolate will not have a smooth, glossy texture that is preferred for desserts. So the printer cannot be used for high-end dessert production. The goal of this research is meant to design an extrusion system of the chocolate printer to solve these problems mentioned above. The goal of the printer is that it can take chocolate chips, temper the chocolate, extrude it out and form shape according to the design. It is designed to be constructed with cheap materials while having accurate control of temperature during the printing process. This research is planned to last for two years long and now I am halfway through the first year. My current plan is to work on a commercial 3D printer and replace its extrusion system with my design. The general frame of the printer is kept because that is not the focus of this research. Right now, I have finished my design of the extruder in 3D models and start building and testing prototypes. In future research, I would expect to have the extrusion system assembled on the 3D printer and investigating the optimal working condition for chocolate printing.