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The power of metal additive manufacturing

Metal additive manufacturing, offers the ability to produce complex parts, reduce costs, and address challenges related to complexity, performance, tooling costs, and supply chain.

Metal additive manufacturing is a relatively new technology compared to conventional production methods such as machining, casting, or forging. This does not prevent it from developing at a fast pace: all industrial sectors are interested in this process, whether to solve problems of complexity, performance, tooling costs, or supply chain.

How does additive manufacturing work?

The word “additive manufacturing” refers to a set of processes that have in common the ability to produce parts by adding material (polymer, metal, ceramic, concrete, etc.) from a digital file.

It is unusual for such a young technology to spread so quickly. Metal additive manufacturing, or metal 3D printing, is only 20 years old, and applications are increasing in all sectors, from medical to aeronautics, automotive, defense, energy, space, and tooling. For all these manufacturers, 3D printing metal parts is a way of producing previously impossible parts to manufacture and reducing costs at different stages of the product’s lifecycle.

One principle, several families of technologies

The first 3D printing technologies appeared in the 1980s. They were used to manufacture plastic parts. It was only at the end of the following decade that the first metal 3D printer appeared. Just as there are different technologies for 3D printing plastic parts, several types of machines can be used to manufacture metal parts by adding successive layers of material. The ISO/ASTM 52900 standard defines several families of technologies and here is an Additive Manufacturing Technologies overview:

Powder Bed Fusion (LB-PBF and EB-PBF)

PBF technology

With powder-bed fusion technologies, the parts are manufactured by overlapping horizontal layers. The geometry of the section to be solidified on each layer is defined by a digital file. In the machine, each layer is carried out in two stages. The first is to spread a layer of metal powder on a tray with a spreading device (roller, scraper, or brush), and the second is to melt the metal where necessary. This melting is achieved by the action of a laser or an electron beam. The part is thus constructed by a succession of spreading and fusion cycles.

The acronym LB-PBF (Laser Beam — Powder Bed Fusion) is generally used to refer to the laser powder bed fusion process, and the acronym EB-PBF (Electron Beam — Powder Bed Fusion) to refer to electron beam powder bed fusion.

Advantages
  • Ability to make very complex parts
  • Parts with high mechanical properties
  • Parts with low roughness
  • Wide choice of materials


Directed Energy Deposition (DED)

DED technology

Directed energy deposition involves creating a melt pool on a substrate using an energy source (laser beam, plasma, or electric arc) and then feeding the melt pool with a filler material (metal powder or metal wire). This material is brought by a depositing nozzle and passes through the energy beam to approach its melting temperature. This technology is referred to as DED (Directed Energy Deposition), which can be declined as DED-P (Powder) for machines that use metal powder and DED-W (Wire) for machines that use metal wire.

Advantages
  • Suitable for the manufacture of large parts
  • Allows the addition of material to existing parts (repair or addition of functions)
  • Parts with high mechanical properties
  • Ability to gradually mix several metals in the same part
  • Compatibility with conventional machine tool architectures

Binder Jetting (BJ)

Binder jetting technology is a “powder-bed” method, based on alternating powder spreading and solidification cycles. Unlike powder bed fusion processes, the powder is solidified here by the deposition of a binder. So there is no melting of the metal in the machine. The binder is a polymer-based product that will need to be disposed of during a complementary step called debinding. The latter involves placing the part in a furnace to evaporate the binder while agglomerating the powder particles to each other. This process is commonly referred to as Binder Jetting and is attracting growing interest due to its good productivity.

Advantages
  • High productivity
  • Total freedom of design (production without supports)
  • Parts with low roughness

Material Extrusion (MEX)

MEX is a method directly inspired by plastic filament production, which consists of depositing strands of polymer material loaded with metal particles.

Sheet Lamination (SHL)

The process of sheet lamination consists in making a complex part by assembling layers that are manufactured separately from each other, by conventional techniques (machining, laser cutting, or other). Applied to metal, this process allows for complex injection molds with moving elements or cooling channels that are impossible to manufacture from a block of raw material. This process can be declined in different forms. For example, some machines manufacture parts by successive welding of thin sheets of metal on top of each other.

PBF and DED lead the market

The two most common metal 3D printing processes used by PBF technology represent around 85% of the global metal additive manufacturing market. This dominant position has enabled it to mature more quickly and to continue to attract significant investment. As a result, 3D printer for metal is becoming increasingly productive and high quality, a trend which is expected to continue for many years.

Additive Manufacturing Processes and Materials

Hydraulic block

The main reason why PBF technology appeals to manufacturers is that it enables them to make parts that could not be manufactured before. Indeed, the principle of production from thin layers of metal (of the order of 50 microns thick) offers great freedom of design and allows designers to imagine more complex, lighter, higher-performance parts, or to produce single operation parts that are costly to assemble. Moreover, this technology is compatible with a wide variety of materials (Steel, Titanium or Aluminum alloys, superalloys, precious metals, etc.). Finally, the level of control of the melting process that is achieved today by the machines makes it possible to obtain parts with high mechanical specifications. By applying the appropriate heat treatments after the printing process, the materials can have equivalent features to forged parts.

DED technology, the second most widely used family of technology in the world, is complementary to PBF in many ways. Whatever the energy source (a laser, an electric arc, or an electron beam), regardless of the type of raw material (powder or wire), the amount of material deposited at each passage of the tool is 5 to 20 times greater than in PBF. Therefore, the parts are less complex than in PBF, but they are manufactured much faster. And the machines available on the market today offer working enclosures larger than one cubic meter, dimensions that are difficult to achieve with powder bed technologies. Finally, they can be used for applications that are impossible to replicate with most other technologies, such as adding material to an existing part (for repair or coating), creating multi-material parts (composed of layers of different metals, or gradually changing from metal A to metal B).

Let’s identify relevant applications

Spine implants

Metal additive manufacturing technologies are expensive. The machines have complex technological building bricks, they require heavy investment in terms of infrastructure and post-processing equipment, and metal powders are more expensive than raw metals. A printed metal part will therefore have a higher cost price than an equivalent part made by machining, casting, or forging. Therefore, metal 3D printing should be reserved for applications that generate value, by identifying gains throughout the product’s life cycle to compensate for the additional manufacturing cost. Fortunately, the list of potential gains is long: mass reduction, raw material savings, optimization of thermal exchanges, increased service life, acceleration of prototyping phases, reduction of assembly times, the addition of functions, improvement of ergonomics, customization of products…

In some cases, it is possible to generate value by printing parts that were previously manufactured by conventional techniques, without the need to modify or optimize the part. This applies to all manufacturers with complex supply chains who wish to reduce transport costs, supply critical spare parts rapidly, or manufacture parts in remote areas. Additive technologies also make it easier to replicate parts for which blueprints are no longer available.

Finally, for all parts that require specific molds or tools, 3D printing can make low-volume production economically viable by eliminating the costs associated with the production of these molds and tools.

Top industries using Additive Manufacturing

Metal additive manufacturing opens new possibilities for design, but the companies that derive the greatest potential from this technology are those that spread the culture of additive manufacturing throughout their departments: R&D, innovation, marketing, industrialization, production, quality Assurance, industrial property… In this way, all these professions will be able to imagine opportunities to generate value thanks to metal 3D printing. Of course, it will be necessary to be able to analyze the feasibility of all the ideas that are generated. Indeed, contrary to popular belief, additive manufacturing is not a way to free yourself from all design limitations. Of course, it allows us to free ourselves from certain constraints specific to subtractive technologies, but it is accompanied by numerous new constraints (considering the gravity and thermal effects on manufacturing, for example). Moreover, each process family has its requirements, which must be known to be able to choose the best available technology for an application.

Advantage of Additive Manufacturing: Mastering the value chain

Created in 2016 on the initiative of Michelin and Fives, two major French industrial groups, AddUp offers a range of technologies and services that is unprecedented in the metal additive manufacturing market. From a technology point of view, first, by offering a range of L-PBF and DED machines. In addition to being the most used, these two processes are perfectly complementary in terms of applications. In terms of services, AddUp stands out for its choice to propose the production of parts in addition to machine sales. This part of manufacturing activity enables us to respond to industrialists whose applications cannot justify the investment in a machine, but not only. It allows manufacturers to be supported at all stages of their projects, from the design stage (with redesign assistance services, for example), to the delivery of finished parts, since AddUp disposes internally of the know-how to ensure the finishing of parts. Finally, by mastering both machine construction and parts manufacturing, AddUp can accompany its Industrial customers in the qualification of their applications and can even propose a new kind of supply chain, with, for example, the possibility for customers to reserve capacity in AddUp workshops to support a ramp-up or absorb possible variations in demand.

AddUp is an industrial company created to meet the expectations of industrial companies. Quality, productivity, repeatability, and reproducibility are at the heart of our concerns, whether for the design of our machines or the production of your parts. Above all, our experts are here to help you integrate additive manufacturing into your business and can assist you in the qualification processes of your projects. Visit our website to learn more about metal additive manufacturing: https://addupsolutions.com/

HISTORY of Additive Manufacturing

The 1st patent on 3D printing (known as “additive manufacturing”) was filed on July 16, 1984. The dealers are French: Jean-Claude André, Olivier de Witte, and Alain le Méhauté for the company CILAS ALCATEL. The same year, in the United States, on August 1, 1984, it was the American Chuck Hull who filed the patent on the stereolithography 3D printing technique. Then the extension of the printing file “.stl” will be created, and the company 3D Systems, a manufacturer of 3D printers. In 1995, the metal 3D printing technology or DMLS (Direct Metal Laser Sintering) appeared. The technology is adapted to metal, with an even more powerful laser.

Read more about additive manufacturing history.

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AddUp, a manufacturer of metal 3D printers, not only offers parts production services but also utilizes its own machines to manufacture components for their 3D printers.

AddUp is a manufacturer of metal 3D printers that operates its own machines in its workshops to offer parts production services to its customers. But did you know that these workshops are also used to manufacture components to be used on our 3D printers? The FormUp 350 has numerous 3D printed parts, which are representative of the different possibilities offered by the technology.

Parts produced on the FormUp350 for the FormUp 350

Dosing hopper

Dosing hopper

AddUp is one of the only manufacturers of metal 3D printers to also offer parts production services, thanks to several workshops in Europe and the United States. When not being used to produce parts for customers, FormUp machines make parts for new FormUp machines. “Generating value through parts that combine multiple functions, have better performance or have shorter lead times is not just a speech we make to our customers. It’s also a virtuous circle that we apply internally,” says Léopold Barry, second-generation FormUp 350 project manager at AddUp. “All these developments aim to make this machine a showcase of the different possibilities offered by 3D printing.”

Hopper mixers

Hopper mixers

Many parts of this machine are made by additive manufacturing, starting with the powder supply system which alone has four printed components. First, the dosing hoppers. These are powder tanks that prevent any interruption in the powder supply to the manufacturing chamber. The design of these parts has been adapted to be made either in a foundry or additive manufacturing to meet short supply time requirements.

Inside these dosing hoppers, there is a part that is also 3D printed. This part is responsible for keeping the powder in motion to avoid any agglomeration that could interrupt production. For this part with complex geometry, additive manufacturing is ideal. On the FormUp 350 x 350 mm build plate, we can print about twenty of these parts at a time, helping to build up stocks of spare parts when needed.

Housing for dosing screws

Housing for dosing screws

Just below the dosing hoppers are the dosing screws, which deposit the powder precisely and uniformly on the surface of the “drawers” that transport the powder in front of the layering device. These dosing screws are installed in a sleeve, which is also 3D printed. “This system, printed in a single operation, presents an interesting alternative to its foundry equivalent, as it allows us to quickly test new designs without additional costs related to developing injection molds. In addition, this one-piece part no longer requires assembly operations and has better sealing,” comments Léopold Barry.

Sleeves

Sleeves

Another essential element of the powder supply system is the rails on which the drawers responsible for bringing the powder is guided into the manufacturing chamber. They are also manufactured on FormUp machines in AddUp workshops. The advantage here is the autonomy gained on the management of this part, with supply times shortened as much as possible because the printing as well as the machining are carried out in-house.

Topology optimization and functions integration

Camera mount

While AddUp engineers are able to use additive manufacturing for the powder supply system, which is one of the key functions of the machine, they did the same for some simpler parts as well, such as camera mounts. On FormUp 350, both cameras are installed on printed brackets. First, the image-taking camera, which takes pictures of the end of melting and the end of powder spreading, is placed on support designed with topology optimization. This technique consists of using simulation software that automatically generates an optimal shape for the part, using the quantity of material just necessary to ensure the positioning function of the camera.

Video camera mount

Second, the video camera mount was designed using another possibility offered by 3D printing: the integration of functions. “During the development of this machine, our teams worked on the cooling management of the video camera, which is placed above the manufacturing enclosure,” explains Leopold Barry. We designed a new version of this mount, which integrates both the function of holding the camera in position and the cooling function.” The latter function is provided by metal blades that act as a radiator. Their surface, impossible to achieve by conventional techniques, has a large exchange surface with the ambient air and avoids any overheating of the camera.

Parts for series machines, but also for prototypes

Hydraulic block

AddUp is also able to take advantage of the possibilities offered by additive manufacturing at all stages of the development of its new machine, including during the prototyping phases. This provided an opportunity to test a new type of hydraulic block. This part, responsible for distributing the coolant fluid in the machine, was the subject of a complete redesign study. What used to be an imposing piece of raw metal pierced by rectilinear channels has become an optimized system, thanks to its mass reduction and the management of fluids inside the channels. Work is still under way to further improve this part before integrating it into production machines. But, in the meantime, the work on this hydraulic block and the tests carried out under real operating conditions serve as a demonstrator for manufacturers in other sectors facing mass reduction requirements on similar systems.

Door handle

Door handle

Lastly, a 3D printed door handle for the FormUp is a perfect way for this machine to display its DNA, proving that it is “designed for additive manufacturing, with additive manufacturing.”

AddUp is proud to source our own components using our additive technology. The FormUp 350 truly is designed for additive manufacturing WITH additive manufacturing! Our engineers will continue to explore opportunities to exploit 3D printing and improve AddUp 3D printing machines!

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Filed Under: PBF

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Additive manufacturing, or 3D printing, has become an essential tool for the military, offering cost and time savings, improved supply chain performance, and enhanced operational readiness.

With its promise to reduce costs and lead times while improving product and supply chain performance, the military has been using additive manufacturing for several years now. The most common applications in the military sector are prototyping, parts manufacturing, tooling and repair.

Whether for manufacturing or repairing equipment, 3D printing has repeatedly proven to be a suitable production method for military forces. Now, additive technology offers even more efficient ways to produce spare parts on demand, improving manufacturing times and supply flows.

In external operations the ability of equipment to last, or its autonomy more generally, are properties and qualities particularly sought after by forces for operational engagement or stationing. Several efforts are being made in this direction, such as reducing logistical flows, which are sources of vulnerability, to limit the exposure of men to threats while reinforcing the autonomy of deployed forces.

How can 3D printing help to maintain the operational readiness of equipment at a level sufficient to ensure the continuity of operations and essential missions?

For operational support to deployed units, the army depends on two major capabilities: repair capacity and spare parts supply capacity. For these two means, 3D printing represents an important interest allowing to gain in autonomy and especially in reactivity.

The use of additive manufacturing is intended to enhance and accelerate repair and supply capabilities down to the tactical support echelons. There are many potential applications such as restoring the usability of a vehicle, by producing new replacement parts or to reduce the logistical flows linked to supply stocks, particularly during an operation.

It is even possible to compensate for a possible shortage of stock or a large consumption of spare parts, for example, in the event of intense military involvement. Another important advantage is that additive manufacturing also makes it possible to produce parts that would no longer be manufactured for various reasons: loss of technical control, obsolescence, no longer being supplied or lack of raw materials, etc. New, lighter parts with complex geometries, printed in 3D, benefit from very good solidity and therefore durability properties because they are made from innovative materials. The equipment will therefore be less heavy to carry and will have a longer lifespan. For example, the production of lattice structure parts makes it possible to lighten a mechanical system while maintaining or even improving its strength.

In short, metal 3D printing can be used to reproduce existing parts for repairing equipment, as well as to create new, optimized parts that provide added operational value. Additive manufacturing improves supply chain responsiveness and reduces inventory, obsolescence risks and overall costs.

Producing as close to operations as possible


The constant need of the military for maintenance and repair parts for heavy equipment during missions leads to very high costs. The possibility of printing the necessary parts quickly and close to the action allows considerable savings in time and production costs.

AddUp responds to this recurrent need of defense industry: to manufacture spare parts and tools directly on the battlefield.

In the context of military operations, additive manufacturing allows the deployment of small batches of large platforms that are easily accessible to the armed services. These ‘mobile labs’ accessible at operational bases are ideal for quickly manufacturing spare parts or adapting equipment for the nearby battlefield.

Read about a Case Study from the French Navy utilizing AddUp’s FormUp 350.

Produce anywhere…


AddUp is the first metal 3D printing machine manufacturer to offer transportable additive manufacturing units. With The AddUp Flex Care System TM, parts can be produced on demand close to your operations. These self-powered units can operate in the most remote areas and harshest environments. They incorporate one or more additive manufacturing machines as well as post-processing machines to provide finished parts for immediate use. Self-sufficiency is undoubtedly a tactical advantage in military operations as it reduces logistical costs and vulnerability to attack from the opposing side.

In post-conflict, disaster support or reconstruction situations, additive manufacturing can help local communities by facilitating the repair and maintenance of strategic equipment.

Conclusion

The defense sector uses additive manufacturing technologies in many ways: different processes, different materials, means of production, etc. There are many applications such as vehicle maintenance, repair of parts, production of new high-performance and optimized parts and integrating new functionalities. The military uses additive manufacturing from research to the deployment phase, with the development of prototypes, tools and functional parts.

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Additively Manufactured Static Mixer | Blog

Read how AddUp’s roller recoater and finer powder particle size distribution (PSD) provides finer features, improved surface finish and eliminates the needs for supports when producing a static mixer.

Written by: Nick Estock, Director of Applications and Business Development

Additive Manufacturing, like any manufacturing process, has its strengths and weaknesses. All processes typically have value-added steps and necessary secondary operations that are a consequence of their shortcomings. Support structures are one of these necessary evils of AM. They are part of the process but add no value to the final part. In fact, they decrease the value because support structures consume material and machine time but then need to be removed after printing. All of this reduces productivity and ultimately costs you money. So, let’s eliminate them! (OK, maybe minimize them..)

AddUp, a joint venture between Michelin and Fives, developed a system to do just that. Michelin has been utilizing AM since the early 2000s, long before I even knew what a 3D printer was (we didn’t have 3d printers or even smartphones when I was in high school). Michelin utilized the technology first to reduce the development cycle for their tire mold inserts, called sipes. Today, they produce over one million of these sipes a year for their production molds. Critically important features to these sipes are: the resolution down to 0.2mm features, shallow overhangs as low as 15 degrees, and surface finish as low as 4 Ra um, as printed.

So, when Michelin embarked on this joint venture with Fives how did they achieve such a high level of quality?  They did so by developing the FormUp 350 as the only industrial Powder Bed Fusion (PBF) machine to utilize a roller recoater in conjunction with a finer powder Particle Size Distribution (PSD).  Typical PBF technologies use a PSD ranging from 25-63 um.  The FormUp can effectively manage, distribute, and spread powders down to 5-25 um.  By using finer powders and a roller, AddUp achieves a better packing density of their build bed up to 70% dense.  Combine this with high quality open parameters and you have a recipe to build finer features, better surface finishes and yes less supports, hassle free and right out of the box!  What do I mean “right out of the box”?  I mean no secret sauce, no special parameters applied in certain areas, and no slowing down the process.  Design it, apply your standard parameters, load it on the machine and go!

Let’s take a look an example, a static mixer our applications team developed to illustrate this point better.

What is a static mixer?

Wikipedia defines this as:

“a precision engineered device for the continuous mixing of fluid materials, without moving components.[1] Normally the fluids to be mixed are liquid, but static mixers can also be used to mix gas streams, disperse gas into liquid or blend immiscible liquids.”

In other words, it is a pipe where two or more fluids are introduced at the inlet and carried across a series of “static” elements such as plates or paddles to homogenize the fluids upon exit.  Why is this a great additive application?  Because you can optimize and customize the design for any given application.  Why is a static mixer a difficult part to produce additively?  Because the mixing elements pose a problem when printed using traditional AM guidelines.  Standard design guidelines for AM means these elements would have to be printed at 45 degree angles.  This limitation would require to either elongate the mixing region of the mixer itself and/or add many more elements to achieve the desired performance.  Either of these options mean you are no longer leveraging the advantages of additive and what’s left is an ineffective expensive part.

Static Mixer with:AddUp Static MixerStandard AM Guidelines (45˙ fins)Reduction
Overall Height305 mm654 mm53%
Material Needed738.5 cc1583.82 cc53%
Build Time88 hours, 32 minutes189 hours, 51 minutes53%

The AddUp Static Mixer increased productivity by 53%!

But, what if you didn’t have this limitation?

The static mixer shown here was printed without these limitations. Our engineers designed this mixer with elements as shallow as 25 degrees without any supports while still achieving an acceptable surface finish.  Not only that but they designed it in less than two weeks and achieved a first-time yield.  How was this possible?  AddUp’s roller and fine powder configuration coupled with robust parameters provide new design freedoms for the AM process.

As shown in Exhibits A and B, using a roller system in conjunction with finer powder, the AddUp system can achieve a reduction in surface roughness by about 10 Ra um for any given upskin/downskin angle when compared to medium powder PSDs with blade recoater configurations.

EXHIBIT A

EXHIBIT B

Don’t forget, this was achieved right out of the box and hassle free!  There are no special downskin parameters.  There is no need for advanced development that can take months and countless hours of engineering and machine time to achieve. These results can be accomplished using our standard, highly productive, bulk and contour parameters. With other machine OEMs, enhanced surface finishes or extreme overhangs often come at the cost of slowing down your productivity. That’s because they are using less laser power at a reduced speed to achieve such results, thus slowing down your productivity.  This also introduces additional variables into the mechanical properties of your part.  Instead of having a singular set of parameters, yielding a known set of mechanical properties throughout the entire volume of your part, you have created areas that can potentially exhibit different behaviors.  The AddUp system achieves these results thanks to a better packing density of our powder bed and our roller with fine powder configuration.

Think this is all too good to be true?  Try me!  We have just completed the renovation of our Cincinnati facility, serving not only as our US headquarters but also as a technical demonstration center.  From powder to part, our workshop has the full capabilities to run benchmark, functional prototypes and even production parts. Our team is ready to support our customers just tip toeing into AM to turnkeying an industrialized application.

Use the form below to tell us about your project and we’ll show you the AddUp difference! We look forward to the opportunity to “un-support” your applications!

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Metal additive manufacturing, specifically laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) technology, offers new possibilities for the molding and tooling sectors. It enables the production of molds with complex geometries, interlocking parts, and conformal cooling channels, leading to improved productivity, reduced cooling times, and enhanced part quality.

Manufacturers in the molding and tooling sectors are now making extensive use of 3D printing. They use plastic 3D printing to make prototype injection or lost-wax molds, 3D sand printing to make inserts, or stack multiple mold layers to make stack molds. Metal additive manufacturing, on the other hand, is developing less rapidly. However, laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) technology has several interesting advantages for these sectors.

New applications in the field of injection molding

PBF technology offers several ways to improve the injection molding process. First, the ability of the L-PBF process to produce parts with complex geometries makes it possible to consider new shapes. The walls of the mold that make contact with the plastic part have the possibility to gain complexity but are limited for two reasons; the need to access the surfaces with machining and polishing tools to reduce their roughness and the need to respect draft angles as the mold shapes must allow the part to be unmolded.

Nevertheless, there are still avenues to explore. As L-PBF technology allows for the manufacture of interlocking parts, mold designers can imagine new types of movement within their molds, by placing “drawers” (moving parts) in areas previously impossible to reach with conventional techniques. Reliability can also be improved. Elements assembled by welding or screwing are generally the weak points of molds used in large series, and metal 3D printing offers the prospect of making them in a single operation, and thus improving their lifetime.

Manufacturers considering the use of metal additive manufacturing to produce injection molds should bear in mind that PBF technology is not well suited to the production of massive parts, for reasons of cost but also because of the accumulation of thermal stresses. It should therefore be avoided to produce complete molds, and its use should be limited to areas where it is of interest.

This constraint, which might seem to be a brake on the deployment of this technology in molds, offers interesting prospects. Designing molds in which the solid part is standard and the section close to the molding wall is printed has advantages. Firstly, it is the possibility of carrying out quicker changes of series, as the lead times for obtaining the molds are generally several months. Secondly, it is the opportunity to reduce downtime, as the storage of printed parts is less than the storage of complete molds. Finally, it is the prospect of envisioning small series production which would not have been profitable in view of the investment in a complete mold. Or, in the long term, to move towards the manufacture of customized products, a world that is currently difficult to access for plastic injection parts.

Productivity and quality gains

Before thinking about using metal 3D printing to develop new products and services, it can be useful to use it to improve what already exists. One of the key applications of L-PBF technology in the world of injection molding is a technique called “conformal cooling”. It consists of optimizing the cooling time of plastic parts in injection molds by creating channels that follow the shape of the part to be cooled. These channels are placed as close as possible to the molding wall and make it possible to reduce cooling times, therefore increasing production rates. In an injection cycle, the material cooling stage is generally the longest. It is by reducing this time that the greatest productivity gains can be obtained. Gains can also be made on the appearance of the injected parts, as placing channels in areas that are usually difficult to cool helps to avoid shrinkage or weld lines, which are problems caused by non-optimal cooling.

While injection molding engineers have always been able to design complex control circuits, they have been limited by the mold making techniques. For a long time, the only techniques available to create pipes in a block of metal were drilling, machining, and layering (the mold is designed in separate layers, each of which is milled and drilled so that the layers are joined together to create three-dimensional pipes). Today, with the techniques of additive manufacturing by laser fusion on powder bed, mold manufacturers have access to a total freedom of design for their regulation channels. It should be noted that the surface conditions of the parts produced by laser fusion on powder bed are particularly adapted to the creation of cooling channels: smooth enough not to generate turbulences in the channels, but rough enough to increase the exchange surface compared to channels made by drilling.

Another advantage of conformal cooling is that by placing control channels as close as possible to the mold cavity, the total volume of metal to be cooled is reduced. This allows the mold to reach its operating temperature more quickly and reduces the time from machine start-up to the first good part being produced, leading to productivity gains and a minimizes the number of defective parts.

Production support tools

Whatever the reasons for a manufacturer’s interest in 3D printing, it is always the case that the experience gained from one project gives rise to other ideas, sometimes in other departments of the company. Significant gains can be generated if we look beyond the products sold to customers and the molds needed to manufacture them by considering the production tool. In any production workshop, there are a multitude of tasks that can be simplified, improved, or secured thanks to custom-made tools. From jigs that facilitate assembly operations, through lightweight hand tools with handles adapted to the hand of each operator, to coded tools that avoid errors during assembly… Additive manufacturing offers many ways to reduce production times, improve product quality, or reduce the risk of MSDs (musculoskeletal disorders).

The same is true for manufacturers who use robots or operate automated assembly lines: whenever a moving part can be lightened, this leads to less vibration, less wear and tear, lower energy consumption, and reduced production times. Additive manufacturing provides answers to these lightweight applications by creating recesses within volumes, creating lightweight structures (lattice structures) or utilizing topological optimization.

To develop all these “indirect” applications of additive manufacturing, and to use it to make “tools” in the broadest sense of the term, a good practice is to encourage all operators and technicians to share the culture of additive manufacturing in the company, not only in the design offices, so that all employees are able to propose ideas for improving the production tool.

Conclusion

The applications of metal additive manufacturing in the field of tooling should continue to develop in the years to come, especially as progress is being made every day on productivity, process control and the development of recipes for metals traditionally used by manufacturers in the sector. These applications will be very varied, as they may concern industrialization times, part quality, production rates, fixed assets and the services provided to customers.

TOOLING AND INJECTION

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In June 2020, the French government launched a support plan for the aeronautics industry to help manufacturers in the sector overcome the consequences of the health crisis and encourage them to accelerate the reduction of the carbon footprint of their activities. (Plan de soutien à la filière aéronautique) 1.5 billion euros will be made available over the next three years to support research and development projects in this field.

3D printing and aeronautics: towards “cleaner” aircraft

Three main levers have been identified to move towards “cleaner” aircraft:

  • reduction of fuel consumption
  • the electrification of appliances
  • the transition to carbon-neutral fuels such as hydrogen

In these three areas, 3D printing can provide answers to manufacturers who wish to overcome the performance limits of equipment made by conventional techniques.

The aerospace industry was interested in additive manufacturing (3D printing) from an early stage and has been using it for decades. It was first used to manufacture prototypes to shorten the development time of new aircraft. Then, in the race to make aircraft lighter, aircraft manufacturers began to print functional parts. Today, critical parts (e.g. engine parts) and even structural parts made by various 3D printing processes can be found on board aircraft.

According to a report by Market Research Future, the number of companies and suppliers certified for additive manufacturing in the aerospace industry is expected to grow by more than 20% per year until 2023. The AddUp group is one of these suppliers capable of meeting the requirements of the aerospace industry: our production workshop based in Salon-de-Provence (Bouches-du-Rhône, France) is certified NF EN 2100: 2018.

DED and L-PBF, two complementary technologies

Our range of machines are also suitable for aerospace applications. For example, DED technology is suitable for the repair of worn parts and is used for the refurbishment of aircraft engine parts. It can also be used to produce large parts, such as nozzles or complex tubing, at a lower cost than machining from scratch and with improved repeatability compared to boiler making.

Laser-Powder Bed Fusion (L-PBF) technology is used for the manufacture of smaller parts, but with great freedom of shape. This allows engineers to consider performance gains in many areas, such as weight reduction, improved fluid flow, and optimized heat exchange.

The following two recent application cases from the aeronautical sector illustrate the type of gains made possible by this technology.

A hydraulic manifold designed for 3D printing

Recently, the Airbus group worked with AddUp and Hall32, a center for the promotion of industrial trades, on the optimization of a hydraulic manifold using metal additive manufacturing. The original part is a fluid manifold, traditionally machined from a titanium block. Thanks to the technique of topological optimization, AddUp and Hall32 managed to reduce the mass of the part by 85%, while improving the flow of fluids.

The project did not stop there! The part required a large quantity of supports to be manufactured, which implied time spent in printing (time spent manufacturing the supports) and machining (time spent removing the supports). The AddUp and Hall32 engineers therefore carried out a second optimization pass to consider the constraints linked to the process (this is called DfAM, for Design for Additive Manufacturing). In its final version, the fluid manifold is printed in 30 hours, compared to 52 hours in its first version, and the machining time has been reduced by 6 hours.

An innovative heat exchanger

HEWAM is a heat exchanger concept developed by Printsky and Temisth. PrintSky is a joint venture between the AddUp group, an expert in metal additive manufacturing, and Sogéclair, one of the international leaders in the integration of high value-added solutions in the fields of aeronautics, space, civil and military transport. Temisth is a company specializing in the development of customized thermal solutions using additive manufacturing. The objective of the HEWAM project was to demonstrate the ability of both partners to design and manufacture an innovative heat exchanger using the PBF process.

The production was entrusted to AddUp who 3D printed this aeronautical part on a FormUp 350 machine. AddUp’s experts used a fine-grained Inconel® 718 powder to produce thin walls with good surface finish, and thus achieve high thermal performance. These thin walls (150 µm) form channels with a complex geometry, which allows HEWAM to present a high heat exchange capacity in a reduced space.

Beyond performance, HEWAM also offers a new way of managing heat dissipation on board aircraft. This dissipation management is primarily thanks to its modular design. Several heat exchangers can be placed next to each other to deliver the thermal power required for the application. Furthermore, its curved shape allows HEWAM to be installed in the engine pylons while leaving space in the center for the cables needed to operate the engines. Its performance/space ratio and modularity make HEWAM an interesting alternative for aircraft manufacturers interested in optimizing heat exchange on board their aircraft.

Other benefits of metal 3D printing

A functional system that used to require the assembly of several small parts can now be 3D printed in a single production run. No more assembly or welding is required, and the risk of breakage in mid-air is reduced. The use of certified materials also ensures that the printed parts are ready to use and able to withstand the rigors of a real-world application.

To prevent aircraft from being grounded, stocks of spare parts have always been provided. However, many of these parts are unused or even obsolete. 3D printing makes it possible to alleviate some of this problem by creating spare parts on demand, depending on the need and where they are needed.

Metal 3D printing seems to have many advantages to allow the aeronautical industry to regain its momentum

From the integration of metal parts with complex geometries, to the reduction of aircraft weight using lightweight metals to save fuel, there are many benefits of additive manufacturing to meet the financial and environmental objectives of the aerospace industry.

By introducing Additive Manufacturing into production, topological optimization, low-cost complexity, fewer parts, lower inventories, and the entire value chain of the aeronautical sector will undergo a real evolution.

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