HBD showcases additively manufactured titanium milling cutter head

Metal Additive Manufacturing machine maker Shanghai Hanbang 3D Tech Co, Ltd (HBD) presented an additively manufactured Ti6Al4V milling cutter head at this year’s TCT Asia 2025, showcasing the benefits of integrated Additive Manufacturing in shortening lead times, costs, and material waste in the tooling industry. The 62 x 62 x 53 mm component was manufactured on an eight-laser HBD 400 Laser Beam Powder Bed Fusion (PBF-LB) AM machine.

Milling tools are vital in modern manufacturing and play a critical role in enabling high-value sectors such as aerospace, automotive, and precision mold-making. Their performance directly impacts machining efficiency, workpiece precision, and production costs, making them a driver in the industry’s evolution toward intelligent and high-efficiency manufacturing.

As demands for higher machining precision and productivity rise, the limitations of traditional milling tools are becoming increasingly evident, explains HBD. These include:

• Excessive weight and poor adaptability: Solid structures lead to high tool weight, making it difficult for small-scale machine tools to accommodate large-sized cutters, thus limiting machining capacity
• Insufficient vibration resistance: Conventional casting methods cannot optimise internal structures, making tools susceptible to vibrations that degrade surface finish and shorten tool life
• Low manufacturing efficiency: Traditional subtractive processes require multiple steps, including forging, machining, and assembly, resulting in significant material waste and extended production cycles

HBD’s new additively manufactured cutter head features an internally optimised bionic honeycomb lattice structure, designed through topology optimisation. The lattice structure enables the part to be over 60% lighter and enhances vibration resistance, thus addressing two persistent challenges of traditionally manufactured tools. The reduced weight will also enable compact machines to support larger milling heads, improving cutting and overall machine efficiency while extending the life of the spindle.

The HBD 400 metal AM machine features a 350 × 400 × 400 mm build volume and an 8×500 W laser setup. The machine is said to enable build speeds up to 12.8x faster than dual-laser machines and allows multiple tools to be additively manufactured in one job, making it well suited to the high-volume production demands of milling tools. Bi-directional powder recoating is used for added stability and quality, while optimised energy controls work to reduce overheating and produce dense parts with minimal stress.

https://en.hb3dp.com/

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