The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Aug. 19, 2025
Filed:
Mar. 28, 2023
Signify Holding B.v., Eindhoven, NL;
Rifat Ata Mustafa Hikmet, Eindhoven, NL;
Ties Van Bommel, Horst, NL;
SIGNIFY HOLDING B.V., Eindhoven, NL;
Abstract
The invention relates to a method of manufacturing a 3D item by means of fused deposition modeling. The method comprises the step of depositing a 3D printable material to form a layer stack of 3D printed material, wherein each layer of the layer stack has a layer height and a layer width. The 3D printable material comprises a thermoplastic polymer and light transmissive particles. The layer stack comprises a plurality of the light transmissive particles, each light transmissive particle having a particle width, being the dimension of the light transmissive particle in a direction parallel to the layer width. For the plurality of light transmissive particles, each ratio of the particle width and the layer width is at least 0.6 so that, in the layer stack, the plurality of light transmissive particles forms a plurality of pinholes delimited by a wall part. When the 3D item is illuminated by a light source, the pinholes create relatively small virtual light sources on the surface of the 3D item, opposite to the surface that is illuminated by the light source, thereby providing a sparkling light effect for an observer looking at the 3D item.