As the new Formula 1 season gets underway, Additive Manufacturing will have played a vital role in the development and manufacture of the cars on track. Metal AM magazine’s Nick Williams recently visited Sauber Motorsport AG at its headquarters near Zürich, Switzerland, and discovered how a partnership with Dutch AM technology supplier Additive Industries has supported both the development of in-house AM applications and an expansion of Sauber Motorsport’s AM services for third parties [First published in Metal AM Vol. 4 No. 1, Spring 2018]
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The formnext powered by TCT exhibition, held from November 14-17, 2017, in Frankfurt, Germany, featured a parallel four-day conference that addressed a wide range of issues of relevance to the Additive Manufacturing community. Besides technical and application innovations, a whole day of the conference was devoted to business considerations and expectations relating to the future development of the AM industry. In this exclusive report for Metal AM magazine, Dr Georg Schlieper highlights a number of key business-related considerations for the future of the industry
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Additive Manufacturing continues to gain a reputation as a key technology that will have a major impact on all aspects of mechanical engineering. Under the guidance of Major Ryan O’Hara, the United States Air Force’s (USAF) Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT), based in Dayton, Ohio, has expanded its AM-focused education and R&D capabilities with the purchase of a Laser Powder Bed Fusion system from Germany’s Concept Laser. In the following article, AFIT’s Benjamin Doane and colleagues highlight work done at the institute to develop AM test bed components to support a high temperature testing programme [First published in Metal AM Vol. 4 No. 1, Spring 2018]
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Over the past decade Honeywell has been a leader in accelerating the adoption of metal Additive Manufacturing in the aerospace industry. With dedicated facilities in five countries, the company is at the forefront of the development of new commercial aerospace applications and the supply chain needed to implement series production. Dr Dhruv Bhate, Associate Professor in the Polytechnic School at Arizona State University, visited Honeywell’s Phoenix facility on behalf of Metal AM magazine and met with Donald Godfrey, an Engineering Fellow at Honeywell and the person most credited with initiating and directing the company’s progress in the field of metal AM [First published in Metal AM Vol. 3 No. 3, Autumn 2017]
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From June 20-22, 2017, the German city of Erfurt became a centre of gravity for Additive Manufacturing, hosting the annual RapidTech technical conference and its accompanying trade exhibition, FabCon 3D. Dr Georg Schlieper visited the event for Metal Additive Manufacturing magazine and highlights a number of innovative trends in metal Additive Manufacturing process technology and applications, including the latest binder-based Additive Manufacturing technologies and innovations in toolmaking [First published in Metal AM Vol. 3 No. 3, Autumn 2017]
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EOS GmbH, based in Krailling, near Munich, has long been recognised as a leader in powder bed Additive Manufacturing technologies for both metals and plastics. The launch of its Additive Minds training and consultancy service, however, represents a significant expansion of the support that the company can offer to those entering the industry. Nick Williams talks to EOS’s Güngör Kara, Director of Global Application & Consulting, on the evolution of the metal AM industry and the changing approach that customers are taking to implement the technology [First published in Metal AM Vol. 3 No. 1, Spring 2017]
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Metal Additive Manufacturing magazine was recently invited to visit the GKN Aerospace facility at Filton, Bristol, UK, to discover the business’s global development activities in Additive Manufacturing (AM) and to view the company’s on-site AM centre. Dr Robert Sharman, Head of Additive Manufacturing at GKN Aerospace, and Tim Hope, Manager of the Additive Manufacturing Centre at Filton, hosted the visit and outlined the company’s current activities and future aspirations in the field of AM for aerospace applications [First published in Metal AM Vol. 2 No. 4, Winter 2016]
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One of the most promising aspects of Additive Manufacturing is the design freedom it enables. One manifestation of this design freedom lies in our ability to manufacture cellular structures such as lattices and honeycombs. Implementing cellular structures with AM, however, poses a range of design and manufacturing challenges. In this article Dr Dhruv Bhate, from Phoenix Analysis & Design Technologies, Inc. (PADT), focuses on a key area connecting design and manufacturing to final part implementation – the mechanical behaviour of these structures and the challenges and approaches to developing a reliable way to predict it [First published in Metal AM Vol. 2 No. 4, Winter 2016]
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There is no doubt that the Additive Manufacturing of series components is quickly becoming a reality. From high-profile applications in the aerospace industry to performance components for the automotive sector, there are now numerous examples of the successful implementation of metal AM. However, the route that a company chooses in order to adopt AM technology could have a significant impact on a component’s development time and cost. As Nick Williams reports, Germany’s FIT AG sees opportunities in leveraging its expertise to supporting companies with the outsourcing of component development and production. To achieve this, the company has created a model AM factory that it plans to replicate worldwide [First published in Metal AM Vol. 2 No. 3, Autumn 2016]
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GKN Sinter Metals, with more than 6,000 employees at 30 locations worldwide, is the world’s leading Powder Metallurgy group. The company produces 11 million PM parts per day, with around 80% going into the automotive industry. The company started its metal Additive Manufacturing activities at its Innovation Centre in Radevormwald, Germany, in 2013. Dr Georg Schlieper visited the centre on behalf of Metal AM magazine and reports on the company’s AM activities and ambitions [First published in Metal AM Vol. 2 No. 2, Summer 2016]
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The automotive industry has successfully embraced metal Additive Manufacturing as a prototyping technology for a number of years. As the technology advances, however, the possibilities for the use of metal AM for series component production are now starting to be explored. In the following review the challenges and opportunities for metal AM in the automotive industry are presented, including a radical concept to use AM parts as key structural elements in the next generation of automotive spaceframes [First published in Metal AM Vol. 2 No. 2, Summer 2016]
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As one of the first major markets for metal additively manufactured products, the importance of the tooling industry has long been recognised. There is still, however, limited information available on what mechanical properties can be expected for the various materials used. This report by Harish Irrinki, Brenton Barmore, Kunal H Kate and Sundar V Atre reviews the published data on various steel powders and processing conditions as well as the mechanical properties that have been obtained using the Selective Laser Melting process [First published in Metal AM Vol. 2 No. 2, Summer 2016]
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