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MAG NORTH AMERICAN EDITION VOLUME 7 ISSUE 3

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HOW EXONE DELIVERED ALUMINUM 6061 COLLABORATIONS, CONTINUOUS FURNACES AND PATENTED BINDER JET INNOVATIONS.

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FROM THE EDITOR

FROM THE EDITOR LAURA GRIFFITHS

AM 2.0 The additive manufacturing (AM) industry is full of buzzwords and phrases. You know the ones, the “disruptors”, the “ecosystems” and the “digital threads” (don’t worry, we demystify that on page 23). Unnecessary? Sometimes, but on a slow news day, they certainly make for a nice game of PR bingo.

The latest term that major players in the industry have seemingly held a secret meeting to coin is “Additive Manufacturing 2.0” and I’ll be honest with you, I don’t hate it.

I first heard “AM 2.0” in a conversation with Desktop Metal CTO Jonah Myerberg who said on our Additive Insight podcast: “When it comes to additive manufacturing, we’re still only a 30-year-old industry and so we’ve built the foundation for additive over the past 20 years, we’ve made a whole generation of engineers comfortable with it and now it’s our turn to bring it into mass production."

Next, it was Stratasys which heralded this new 2.0 era with the launch of a trio of polymer technologies and ambitions to see “global manufacturing leaders move beyond prototyping to fully embrace the agility that

3D printing brings to the entire manufacturing value chain.”

Shortly after, it was the turn of Shapeways with a comment from special purpose acquisition company Galileo Acquisition Corp on the “massive Additive Manufacturing 2.0 opportunity” it envisioned as it announced a listing on the New York Stock Exchange.

Since then, I’ve found the term creeping into conversations more regularly and the common theme appears to be around production and continued maturation of the industry.

Evidence of this is clear across the pages of this very issue; in AM being used to build rocket engines (page 9), in the continued advancements to metal binder jet (page 16), in the 54% of engineering businesses who increased their usage of 3D printing for functional end-use parts last year (according to 3D Hubs on page 28) and so on.

Speaking of services, this issue also includes our annual AM service provider map. If you're looking to kickstart your next project, find a local manufacturing partner with our free pull-out or online at mytct.co/Map21NA.

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 03

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TCT VOLUME 7 ISSUE 3 25

COVER STORY

6 9

06. HOW EXONE DELIVERED AL 6061

ExOne on collaborations, continuous furnaces and patented binder jet innovations.

Aerospace

09. NEW SPACE, NEW APPLICATIONS

Head of Content Laura Griffiths speaks to Sintavia about additive’s growing play in the space sector.

13. THE EASY PART

nTopology’s Ryan O’Hara tells TCT about the redesign of an aerospacegrade turbogenerator housing.

14. “AM IS HERE TO STAY”

Aerospace expert Eliana Fu answers questions about supply chain, her time at Relativity and why the creation of new AM materials is so important.

Industrial AM

16

19 Tooling, jigs & fixtures 19. FAST CYCLE

Mantle explains how its TrueShape hybrid technology will accelerate product development.

DIGITAL THREAD

23. ADDITIVE IN CONTEXT

Laura speaks to Authentise CEO Andre Wegner about the value of contextual data.

25

SERVICES

25. ADDITIVE ASSEMBLE

Sam speaks to BEAMIT General Manager Andrea Scanavini about AM mergers and acquisitions.

28. REINTRODUCING HUBS

Laura catches up with Hubs CEO Bram de Zwart to talk about bringing manufacturing online.

16. EVOLVING BINDER JET

Senior Content Producer Sam Davies speaks to a user, a vendor and a materials firm about the latest developments in metal binder jet.

23

23

30

Innovators on Innovators

30. HANS LANGER X LIN KAYSER Get a taste of the first Additive Insight Innovators on Innovators episode as two entrepreneurs discuss the future of design and manufacturing.

Expert Advisory Column

32

32. AN AM PROBLEM SHARED Dr Candice Majewski shares some thoughts on the importance of collaboration and diversity in AM.

6

HOW EXONE FINALLY BROKE THE CODE ON ALUMINUM 6061 Global collaborations and new binder jetting processes involving continuous furnaces and material approaches were key.

I

n March, ExOne announced that it had qualified binder jet 3D printing of aluminum 6061 with Ford Motor Co., delivering parts with 99% density and properties comparable to traditional manufacturing. The achievement is expected to unlock new benefits in manufacturing, such as new lightweight part designs that can now be delivered at super-fast binder jetting speeds that support high-volume serial production.

Delivering a commercially viable achievement in this area has evaded researchers for more than a decade, and the story of how it was achieved demonstrates the value of global research partnerships, innovative thinking, and experience.

While collaborative and individual patents are expected to be filed

by ExOne and Ford as a result of this ongoing project, partners such as Abbott Furnace Company also played a key supporting role in advocating new patent-pending approaches to help make binder jetting of Al 6061 more production friendly.

While most binder jet 3D printers sold today are paired with a batch sintering furnace, ExOne found that Al 6061 preferred a continuous furnace, the very type that would be advantageous in high-volume production.

“The use of a continuous furnace turned out to be a key element of our patent-pending approach,” said Rick Lucas, ExOne Chief

Technology Officer and VP, New Markets. “In our roadmap, 6061 aluminum was always the peak. It’s the most commonly used aluminum in the world; it’s what manufacturers want. But it’s also the most challenging to print and sinter.

A lot of great minds came together to make this happen, building on decades of foundational work.”

SHOWN:

ABBOTT’S NEW VULCAN DELUBE SYSTEM IS A KEY PART OF EXONE’S SUCCESSFUL SINTERING OF AL 6061

THE QUEST TO SUCCESSFULLY SINTER HIGHER STRENGTH ALUMINUM ALLOYS

Generally, the higher the strength of aluminum, the more difficult and expensive it is to form with traditional manufacturing.

Common manufacturing methods, such as metalcasting and machining, each present limitations on the types of geometries that can be produced as well as the specific aluminum alloys that can easily be shaped into a part. Each alloy also contains its own properties for items such as strength-to-weight ratio, weldability, energy absorption, and resistance to corrosion, cracking and heat that cause a lot of trade-offs.

caused higher strength aluminum alloys to be a target of 3D printing companies. While laser powder bed fusion (LPBF), can print certain aluminum alloys, it’s largely been held back by its slower processing speeds and relative expense.

At the same time, the world needs strong aluminum alloys to deliver a more fuel-efficient and sustainable future. The material is lightweight, relatively strong, highly recyclable and can therefore help lower energy costs and carbon emissions in automobiles, airplanes, military equipment and more.

Binder jet (BJT) 3D printing, which selectively deposits binder into a bed of powder particles and is up to 100 times faster than LPBF, has been seen as a potential pathway to success. However, sintering bound-powder aluminum parts to high densities has been a wellknown challenge. The metal injection molding (MIM) market has been trying to develop a method to successfully do so for decades. So, while both MIM and BJT could bind aluminum particles into a precision “green” form, neither had found a reliable way to sinter these forms to high densities while retaining shape and properties.

The strong demand and challenges surrounding aluminum have long

With strong incentives to find a solution, however, research continued

06 / www.tctmagazine.com / VOL 7 ISSUE 3

cover story

3 LEFT:

EXONE CAN NOW BINDER JET 3D PRINT AL 6061 PARTS WITH HIGH DENSITY, TIGHT GEOMETRIC CONTROL AND PROPERTIES COMPARABLE TO TRADITIONAL MANUFACTURING

with gasoline and other materials, it’s best to 3D print in a controlled atmosphere chamber free of oxygen and with safety controls. (ExOne will begin selling an X1 160Pro with these features in 2022.)

Second, this oxide layer is also what makes aluminum difficult to sinter, as the oxide essentially forms a hard, chemically stable shell around the aluminum particle with a much higher melting point. A particle of aluminum may begin to liquefy during sintering, but it can remain inside the shell – never fusing with adjacent particles.

“A lot of great minds came together to make this happen.”

worldwide down two main branches: methods to successfully sinter standard aluminum powders bound together in a form, and laser printing higher-strength aluminum alloys with modified powders or other approaches.

EXONE PULLS ALL THE RIGHT LEVERS

At ExOne, aluminum development had been underway with varying intensity for many years. In 2019, that work again intensified after the launch of ExOne’s patented Triple Advanced Compaction Technology (ACT), which delivers the consistent green parts needed for success.

The project was led by Patrick Dougherty, whose Ph.D. research had focused on metal powder mechanics, particle flow, and tribology at Carnegie Mellon University.

Dougherty began by studying the wide body of work and efforts to date on the subject, while also conducting in-depth interviews with researchers around the world on their experiences and insights. His goal was to find the gaps between failures and near successes, and pinpoint possible avenues that weren’t fully explored.

Binder jetting of aluminum is challenging for several key reasons.

SHOWN:

A CONTROLLED ATMOSPHERE VERSION OF THE X1 160PRO WILL BE OFFERED IN LATE 2022 AND WILL BE CAPABLE OF PRODUCTION 3D PRINTING AL 6061

One, the powder is highly reactive at the moderate-to-fine particle sizes that are used to deliver high-density results in binder jetting. This is because aluminum particles instantaneously form oxide layers when exposed to air and generate heat in the process. While it’s possible to engineer some of this risk out of the powder, and manufacturers deal with these risks every day

Getting adjacent particles to fuse together in a controlled way, a process that begins with necking, is a vital part of successful sintering. In fact, when sintering any bound metal parts, it’s not desirable to ever reach a fully liquid state in the furnace, which would erode the geometry of the part and negate the point of 3D printing it in the first place.

Dougherty and a team of collaborators agreed to pursue several potential strategies to overcome these challenges. “There were a lot of alleyways we went down with a lot of great partners that just didn’t work,” Dougherty said.

“But I’ll never forget the first one that actually densified into a nice, tidy little square.”

In late 2020, ExOne began reporting consistent and repeatable densities of 99% for Al 6061 – as well as favorable material properties on par with traditional die-cast aluminum alloys and tight geometric control during sintering.

“The ExOne team is proud to offer Al 6061 as we aggressively expand the use of binder jetting for high-volume production,” said John Hartner, ExOne’s CEO. “We’re confident this achievement will enable new designs that will help lower energy consumption, decarbonize products, and deliver all-new performance benefits in high volumes that will improve the world.”

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 07

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AEROSPACE

TCT Head of Content Laura Griffiths speaks to Sintavia about new ventures in rocket building.

I

f the MakerBot Replicator was the poster child for the 3D printing maker movement, those huge, customized metal laser sintering systems from EOS’ AMCM GmbH business may be well on their way to being that of the additive manufacturing (AM) space race.

First adopted by new space launch outfit Launcher to 3D print a liquid rocket engine in a single piece back in 2019, further modified EOS systems from AMCM, short for Additive Manufacturing Customized Machines, have been acquired by UKbased Orbex to ramp up its in-house capability for the production of more than 35 large-scale rocket engines and main stage turbopump systems per year, and most recently Sintavia, which is set to take delivery of two M4K-4 systems this summer.

For the Florida-based metal AM provider which focuses primarily on the aerospace and defence industries, it’s a journey that began towards the end of last year

as demand from customers for a more optimized way to print large-scale, singlecomponent metal parts for aerospace soared. Now, with two M4K-4 systems joining its ever-expanding line-up of AM equipment, Sintavia believes this new capability will provide a North American first for commercial aerospace and space customers.

“As we have developed the company and as we've grown, there's been a coalescing around certain part categories which are really good for additive,” Brian Neff, Sintavia’s Chief Executive Officer, told TCT. “One of those categories is in regenerative rocket thrust chamber assemblies (TCA). This is an area where virtually 100% of all thrust chamber assemblies currently in the market are being printed including in more traditional models. I think that this has been known

as a very good part for additive because the way regenerative cooling works is very similar to a heat exchanger with an internal passageway flowing very, very cold liquid propellant up into a very hot chamber. It's a great part for additive.”

Sintavia’s current AM capacity would be the envy of most engineers. With 30 high-speed printers in-house, including multiple from GE Additive, TRUMPF and, of course, EOS, including eight M400-4 quad laser printers, Neff shared how the company was already well equipped with the experience and strategies needed to enter the rocket building arena. What they needed was to go bigger.

“The limitations that exist on current machines are that they're just not tall enough,” Neff explained. “The way that people have done it in additive up until now has been basically printing three parts and building flanges and welding them together. What the M4K allows us to do is actually manufacture each thrust chamber assembly as a monolithic piece.

“It's a game changer, particularly for the rocket propulsion industry.”

SHOWN: THE AMCM M4K-4 HAS A 1-METER-TALL BUILD HEIGHT WITH FOUR 1KW LASERS

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 09

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AEROSPACE

3 LEFT:

SINTAVIA CEO BRIAN NEFF

heat exchanger - that's the key. We have developed ways to do that.”

“The commercial space industry is pulling the commercial aerospace industry into greater adoption of AM.” So you can manufacture the injector, the barrel, the nozzle as a single unit, which completely changes the game. Every time you're joining two components together, you have to create a larger flange, which becomes a heat sink, which affects the performance of the rocket. You're not able to reach certain cooling strategies inside the thrust chamber assembly because you have to join them in post-processing, and everything has to align perfectly. It's a sub-optimal way of printing these TCAs. With the M4K, I think it's a game changer, particularly for the rocket propulsion industry, in the sense that you can go back and redesign your components to do away with any sort of flanges. That's a really, really big deal.”

ADDITIVE ADVANTAGE According to AMCM, Launcher’s E-2 engine combustion chamber was developed as an “AM-capable combustion chamber from the very beginning” to bring together benefits such as those described by Neff into a single structure.

The same can be said of Sintavia’s customers who the company is now working closely with to redesign parts to reduce assemblies and take advantage of the M4K-4’s 450mm x 450mm x 1000mm build capacity for TCAs and other thermodynamic parts and aerofoils.

“Right now, we have one customer that prints a large heat exchanger in four pieces,” Neff said.

“Now we can do that as a single unit so long as you can figure out how to get the powder out of

The M4K-4 has been described as a “stretched and widened” version of the EOS M400-4 due to the larger build capacity, more powerful lasers and upgraded cooling system.

Once installed, Sintavia plans to put the machines to work with high performance copper and nickel alloys. The similar architecture to the M400-4 means Sintavia already has three years of hands-on experience with the platform to draw from.

Neff offers an aerospace analogy whereby if a pilot is qualified to fly a 767 aircraft, they can also pilot a 757 or similar. Of course, there are considerations to be made due to the build scale. For example, AMCM shared with TCT how deformation of the workpiece due to the high thermal load during build-up can be counteracted with accurate simulation tools, but Neff is confident that Sintavia is armed to make it work for what has been described as “overwhelming” demand from customers. Notably, despite the disparity in market size, much of that push to innovate is coming from the space segment rather than aerospace.

“What we've seen is that the commercial space industry is pulling the commercial aerospace industry into greater adoption of additive, which is great to see,” Neff elaborated. “The commercial space industry, if you take just the launch aspect of it, is very small still compared to commercial aerospace.

Even with the parts that we've manufactured for that world, usually on the business aviation side at this point, we've seen a very sort of slow adoption historically. […] They're seeing the way that these rocket designers and rocket manufacturers are looking at additive and I think that’s created somewhat of a pull to the market and that's really wonderful to see because I love the rocket industry and I think it's got an amazing future but I think that commercial aerospace is really just such a big market that, for us to be a big player, is really one of the goals that we have.”

The decision to bring these new machines in-house was driven by

the requests of commercial space launch customers to create TCAs with fewer traditional joining steps, optimize regenerative cooling passages and, as a result, reduce lead times and complexity. That combination of advantages, according to Neff, is crucial.

“In additive, you have to be fixing a problem,” Neff explained. “You have to be doing something better or faster or cheaper, hopefully all three, in order to be successful.

I think people in the industry are still, in a lot of ways, like ‘well, I can print this a different way and that's what makes it better’. No, what makes something better is, is it faster or cheaper or does it perform a lot better? In this case, our customers came to us and said, 'we really want to do away with these flanges, it takes time, we’ve got to machine them, there's a weak spot and it is sub-optimal from a flow standpoint.'”

Taking a moment to ponder future possibilities, while Neff is keen to emphasize that using additive is about uniting the right application and benefits, for those companies like Launcher or Relativity Space who have ambitions of fully 3D printing entire rockets and engines, he believes there’s value to be found in looking beyond simply what we can achieve today.

“If you want to get kind of far out, you're not going to have a foundry on Mars,” Neff posits. “You're going have to print everything when you're on Mars. I think when people say that they're really trying to think a step ahead. They’re thinking, well, when we're on other celestial bodies, even the moon, people will try to print with solar energy and moondust and this is going to be the manufacturing technology that's used. You're not going to have this big melting cauldron of hot metal that you're pouring into shapes and then wasting all this stuff. You're going to be using 3D printing. I think when companies market in that direction they're also saying to the market, 'we can do it here and then we can do it up there in space.'

I think that's a really cool thing.”

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 011

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THE EASY PART WORDS: SAM DAVIES

W

hen asked to tell the story of a redesigned aerospace-grade turbogenerator housing powered by nTopology software and metal 3D printing, KW Micro Power’s President, Enrique Enriquez, questions why anyone would need to know anything beyond the 44% weight saving.

“I would be more than happy with just 20-25% weight reduction,” he is quoted as saying on the nTopology website. But thankfully Ryan O’Hara, the software firm’s Technical Director of Aerospace and Defense, never tires of regaling nTopology’s wins.

KW Micro Power is a manufacturer of high-power density Auxiliary Power Units (APUs) for commercial aviation and military applications. For APUs on board aircraft or drones, the weight is considered to be the most important consideration.

Previously, a CNC machined version of the generator housing weighed 10.4kg, but after the redesign with the nTopology Platform, this was brought down to 5.9kg.

Such a weight-saving was achieved with variable shelling after the loads on the housing were confirmed to be relatively small using nTopology’s integrated static and modal analysis simulation tools.

“We handle geometry as one math equation,” O’Hara told TCT. “In a traditional CAD tool, they think of each surface as its own individual set of math equations because it’s a bunch of surfaces tied together. By treating it as one, we can shell a part and we can vary that thickness where we need to. We made it thick at the ends and thin in the middle.

That’s really all we did in this case.”

Having removed some material from the housing, O’Hara’s team then ran some stress simulations on the loading conditions provided, adding material back where a high stress was detected. Even still, nTopology

was able to remove twice as much weight as KW Micro Power had anticipated and did so within a single day’s work.

And that is only half the story. While removing weight from the redesigned model within nTopology’s software, O’Hara’s team recognized the opportunity to integrate cooling channels in the hollowed-out structure. “Everybody wants a lighter part,” O’Hara said, “but they also want it to perform better, right?”

“Engineering is unnecessarily hard sometimes.”

This was the first time that KW Micro Power had used cooling channels on a microturbine component. Using engine fuel as the cooling medium, the cooling channels reduced the maximum operating temperature by 33%, with the external temperature of the generator dropping 86%, down to 27°C, making it safe to touch. This allows KW Micro Power to use Aluminum F357, which is certified for mission critical applications, to print the part with VELO3D’s metal powder bed fusion technology.

To understand the impact these design changes would have on the housing, thermal FE analysis and CFD simulations were then carried out, while nTopology also tested the solution for fatigue strength, grip force, pull-out breaking force and behavior during take-off and landing.

“Anytime you can get the design and the simulation closer together, the better your solution is going to be,” O’Hara explained. “Now the housing doesn’t just hold the generator anymore, it’s cooling the generator, it’s preheating the fuel.”

Such rewards normally come after such hard work. But within a day, O’Hara and his team were able to reduce its weight by nearly half, cool the temperature by a third, and integrate multiple functions into a single part. Yet, he claims it was the ‘easiest part ever.’

“One of the big reasons I came to work for this company was that engineering is unnecessarily hard sometimes,” O’Hara finished. “And then I think, what a fascinating time we live in when we can design these [parts]. Key to this is that the manufacturing capabilities or the ability to do complex parts is better than what we can actually design. A big mission for us is to even that playing field out.”

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 013

“AM IS HERE T O

ver the past year, the now ubiquitous Zoom window has afforded us a small but tangible snapshot into each other's lives. For Eliana Fu [EF], it’s the glittering Las Vegas sign in the background which signifies a recent move from Los Angeles to join the North American outfit of laser and machine tool manufacturer TRUMPF.

We’re meeting remotely to talk about aerospace and with a wealth of experience from welding at TWI to rockets at SpaceX, Fu has much to draw from. A materials science graduate, Fu was employee number 20 and the first female engineer at Relativity, a company that was set up with a grand vision to fully 3D print and launch a rocket. Now, as an Industry Manager within TRUMPF’s laser division, Fu’s work is centred on additive manufacturing (AM) in the aerospace and medical markets.

Here, TCT Head of Content Laura Griffiths speaks to Fu about all things additive and aerospace including supply chain flexibility, new materials and how aerospace is leading the charge for AM innovation elsewhere.

TCT: The last year has stimulated conversations around supply chain and AM’s role within it. Where do you think aerospace can benefit from the flexibility of AM within its supply chain?

EF: We saw immense supply chain woes during the pandemic and then recently, again, during the Suez Canal crisis. I think for the long lead time components or materials which are single source, I'm really surprised if people haven't become more sensitive to the supply chain issues. I think AM can alleviate some of these issues if certain parts, let's say nonfracture critical parts, can be made by 3D printing because it will help take some of the burden off. What we need to always remember is, don't waste time by reinventing the wheel because files exist or don't select the wrong material for medical applications because they can't be autoclaved. A little more coordination and file sharing from that aspect, that also helps alleviate some of that burden.

TCT: Commercial aerospace was heavily affected by the challenges over the last year.

From your experience, has that disruption had an impact on the adoption of AM technologies and applications within the sector as it tries to recover? Could it play a role in the recovery?

014 / www.tctmagazine.com / VOL 7 ISSUE 3

SHOWN: AM DEVELOPMENTS IN COPPER ARE OPENING UP MORE APPLICATIONS (SOURCE: TRUMPF GROUP)

EF: The industry will come back. Consumer passenger flights will return. I think one of the interesting things is, some of the pain points in the supply chain were actually brought to the forefront and one of the methods to alleviate that was using AM. It's even possible that some parts whose manufacture you couldn’t do traditionally during that time period and was converted to AM, they may never go back.

TCT: When discussing AM in aerospace, the GE Leap Fuel nozzle is still commonly cited as the most well-known application. While we have of course seen numerous other examples of AM in end-use aerospace parts, does that speak to how challenging it is to get an aerospace part into the air?

EF: We still haven't found that one golden egg type of product that's going to be that game changer. Although hundreds of those parts have been printed, there are still plenty of polymeric parts that have also been printed that are flying today on commercial aircraft. I mean, there almost isn't an aerospace program that doesn't have something printed.

We still need to evaluate, very carefully, where it makes sense to have a 3D printed part or where it still makes sense to use traditional manufacture.

The cost equivalency doesn't always translate one to one because we don't take into account things like downstream post-processing and component testing and integration and all those kinds of things.

So that's one of the things that's holding us back.

TCT: Prior to TRUMPF, you were at Relativity Space. Can you talk about your experience there and how you navigated turning traditionally manufactured parts into an AM only product?

5 ABOVE:

THE ABILITY TO 3D PRINT PARTS IS PROVIDING OPPORTUNITIES TO GET TO SPACE FASTER (SOURCE: TRUMPF GROUP)

4 RIGHT:

ELIANA FU, INDUSTRY MANAGER FOR AEROSPACE AND MEDICAL AT TRUMPF

AEROSPACE

TO STAY” EF: I had a great time at Relativity Space. There's a lot of firsts that they created, saying that we'll be the first to fully 3D print and launch a rocket by using additive processes. I think what's different about it is bringing that process in-house, decreasing the lead time, and the unique advantage of AM (which is not just to build unique designs or components) but what it offers is the opportunity to get to space faster. So, it's a customer who would have to wait years or more on any other person's flight, if they were going to other space providers you'd be at the bottom of that list! It creates opportunities for other people to get their products into space and that is also true of all the other new space companies. I think it's fantastic. It's opening up the possibility of more spaceflight for more people.

TCT: Can you talk about any key challenges that you think are prohibiting the acceleration of AM in aerospace?

EF: Some parts that you think would be cool to make by AM, you simply can't make them. Feedstock doesn't exist or the size of the machine doesn't work

with the component that you want to make so you still cannot print everything that you want to print. In metallics, some materials just don't lend themselves to the AM process because the equivalency would be unweldable so they suffer from cracking. So, working with materials manufacturers to find out what direction new materials designed for AM and what AM processes are the best ones to match with those [materials]. Some of the other things are continuous improvements in the technology. For example, TRUMPF now has 500°C preheating of the larger TruPrint 5000 powder bed machine that will alleviate some of these kinds of problems.

TCT: You’ve previously emphasized the importance of creating new materials specifically for AM processes. Can you talk about the progress that is being made there?

EF: The main materials for AM, things like Inconel 718 or Ti-6Al4V, they come from the wrought product world and they've been with us for like over 60 years. They just happened to be able to be melted and solidified by a laser beam but that doesn't mean that we should be standing still, we should be looking at new materials designed specifically for AM or even consider changing what we know about existing alloys so that they work better with AM. I'm talking about things like high-strength aluminum alloys, where the strength comes from lower cost elements that provide the strengthening mechanisms. Using things like copper alloys for rocket engines by laser powder bed printing, that's interesting, things like the GR-Cop 42 alloy. We need to think about making titanium alloys cheaper or more sustainable and then, a huge topic, implications for recycling and reducing the overall carbon footprint of the process.

TCT: At TRUMPF specifically, we’re seeing advancements in green laser technology increasing

productivity for certain materials.

Are there any opportunities here for aerospace?

EF: You’ve touched on my favorite subject. They're super exciting and they're really suitable for reflective materials like copper, also aluminum and then noble metals like gold, silver, and platinum. So using the shorter wavelength means that more of the laser energy is used and not reflected away. So that results in the higher as-printed density, better surface finish and a nicer product overall. I see green lasers coupled with things like the GR-Cop materials being able to print better products like rocket engine components or even commercially pure copper for electrical thermal conductivity devices, so whether they're heat exchangers or other kinds of thermal devices, having a higher success rate. I'm super pumped for that.

TCT: In a recent Women in 3D Printing panel, you spoke about how aerospace is an industry “sticking its neck out” when it comes to leading the way with AM. Can you elaborate on that and how aerospace might inspire AM adoption in other sectors?

EF: Aerospace and space have always been, I think, where innovations have taken place. Things like Velcro came about as a result of designing products for spaceflight. But in fact, right now, we're seeing other industry sectors that are making innovations and using AM to help them where it makes sense. I would say a big one would be customization in healthcare and medical, like making a 3D printed custom titanium ribcage or printing dental components and implants. […]

I moved to Las Vegas so a few weeks ago, I was able to see the world's biggest 3D printed art sculpture at the Raiders stadium here in Las Vegas and, talking about the home printing hobbyist and craft people, DC Comics released STL files for people to be able to print their favourite characters at home. So, AM is here and it's here to stay.

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 015

EVOLVING BINDER A

t several intervals over the last ten years, the business decisions of GE have marked the progression of metal additive manufacturing (AM). There was the LEAP fuel nozzle application, proving its capacity for volume production; the acquisitions of Concept Laser and Arcam to further underline its commitment to AM technology; and then its entry into binder jet with the H2 program, a validation of this particular process’ potential.

Famously, GE Additive’s binder jet project got underway when then General Manager Mohammed Ehteshami tasked a team with developing a new machine within 55 days. They had a prototype ready to announce within 47 but have spent the subsequent three years taking a steadier approach as it readies to introduce a commercial product to market. The H2 efforts have gone on to encompass a beta program that piqued the interest of power generation firm Cummins, metals specialist Sandvik and transportation company Wabtec.

Wabtec has been using the technology for two years, deploying it alongside its existing laser melting 3D printing platforms in its Grove City, PA facility after initial work in GE Additive’s Cincinnati labs. The company considers binder jet to be a ‘unique metal process’ and is using applications of casting as its guidepost to identify additive manufacturable parts.

Currently, Wabtec is carrying out business case analyses on engine components, traction systems and emission control systems in line with its services to the freight and transit sectors, while spare parts are also on the agenda.

Wabtec's 13-strong AM team is being involved in the majority of the company's ‘major initiatives’, including its battery-electric freight locomotive efforts which will reduce emissions by at least 10%. It is said that AM is being embraced company-wide, with Wabtec excited to see how much disruption technologies like binder jet could cause.

“Additive manufacturing provides that opportunity to innovate by unlocking traditional design constraints,” Wabtec’s Global Additive Manufacturing Leader Anthony Mott told TCT. “There is an opportunity to improve rail products through the improved efficiency, better quality, better reliability, all at a competitive price point. And that price point is where binder jet really shines. Binder jet provides those traditional benefits but at a speed that provides better price per part cost. That makes that business case much more attractive.”

016 / www.tctmagazine.com / VOL 7 ISSUE 3

These benefits have not only encouraged GE to explore binder jet 3D printing but enticed Digital Metal, Desktop Metal and HP to follow the path set out by ExOne. What for a while was a niche 3D printing process, is now very much a competitive space. And with increased competition comes new ideas.

MEET META Originating from within MIT, binder jet techniques typically see binding agents deposited onto a powder bed with a levelling roller laying down more powder to form parts layer by layer. After the print, parts are removed from the powder, cured and then go through sintering or infiltration.

GE Additive is perhaps the most tight-lipped about the intricacies of how its binder jet process works, but HP has publicly revealed there is no debinding step in its process.

Meanwhile, Desktop Metal has come to market with a bi-directional single pass jetting technology that applies powder deposition, spreading, compacting, ballistic suppression and binder jetting with each pass over the build area. It also has the Live Sinter software platform which generates negative offset geometries to fill part designs with cells that go through the process of shrinking and distorting the parts’ experience in a furnace to eliminate the need for supports and reduce trial and error in sintering. Such increased competition has seen binder jet pioneer ExOne develop its patented NanoFuse binders which are embedded with nanoparticles to simplify the sintering process and improve part quality.

The latest company to step into the binder jetting ring is one spun out of the University of Liverpool: Meta Additive. Described as ‘reactive binder jet printing’, Meta’s process leans on a binder made up of molecular ink, nanoparticles and microparticles which can simultaneously bind and infiltrate the powder bed with functional build material.

When the binder sees the powder bed, there is a reaction within the process that ensures the ‘green part’ is much stronger than conventional binder jet parts. As a result, parts can be up to 88% dense, meaning heat treatment is more of a ‘consolidation step,’ while shrinkage rates are as low as 2%.

SHOWN: META ADDITIVE'S BINDER JET TECHNOLOGY

SHOWN: GE ADDITIVE'S H2 MACHINE CREDIT: GE ADDITIVE

INDUSTRIAL AM

ER JET WORDS: SAM DAVIES

The research that has spawned this process has its roots in atomic layer deposition and chemical vapor deposition, with Meta founder and CTO Dr Kate Black eventually beginning to consider what impact the chemistries they were working with could have in a 3D printing process. In binder jetting, using a sacrificial binder causes implications with density and shrinkage which prolong the process. Meta Additive was born out of a motivation to address such issues.

“Binder jet appealed to me because, inherently, the printing process is quick; it’s all the post-processing steps that are the issue,” Dr Black told TCT. “Can we eliminate some of those processes so that we can scale up for mass manufacture?

Can we get rid of some of the issues that you’re seeing with shrinkage and density?

Can we use chemistry to eradicate those issues? That was at the heart of what Meta wanted to do.”

“Metal binder jet has a unique role to play in delivering lightweight parts.”

The importance of chemistry, for Dr Black, goes beyond the binding ink and, unsurprisingly, converges on the build materials at the disposal of manufacturers. She analogizes an artist being constrained by working with one or two colors as opposed to a full palette; more materials will facilitate much smarter products being developed.

“Everything about manufacturing is to do with materials,” she said. “If we don’t have the materials, it’s just an idea in your head and it will stay an idea unless you have the materials.”

CHEMICAL COLLABS The quickest way to provide those materials is via collaboration, like that between Desktop Metal and Uniformity Labs. Their partnership is several years old, yet only became public knowledge in March when the pair announced the development of Aluminum 6061 powder for Desktop Metal’s Production System.

Uniformity aligned with Desktop Metal because it values the Production System’s inert processing environment, which allowed it to produce a higher safety profile of powder, as well as its reliability and reproducibility. The resulting material is said to boast an elongation greater than 10%, improved yield strength and improved ultimate tensile strength versus wrought 6061 aluminum with comparable heat treatment.

Upon announcing the launch of the product, Uniformity Labs CEO Adam Hopkins noted that the door to a ‘wide variety of thermal and structural applications’ had been opened across industries. Hours later, a leader of one such industry, Ford Motor Company, had announced their own aluminum 6061 binder jet material in partnership with ExOne. For Hopkins, it was no surprise.

“The automotive industry has been massively interested in aluminum from the beginning. Ten years ago, people said ‘can we binder jet aluminum?’

But the real question was, ‘can you sinter aluminum?’ And the answer has basically been no, not to a good density, not to get great properties,” Hopkins told TCT. “There’s lots of press and sinter aluminum out there, hundreds of thousands of tonnes, if not millions of tonnes, per year in some cases. But can you make complicated parts? Can you pair that with jetting and can you get wrought-like properties? Can you get the properties that you might get from a machined block of metal? That type of capability is what we’re bringing to the table and that becomes really exciting.”

In, as ExOne dubbed it on the front cover of TCT Magazine volume 7 issue 1, the year of binder jet, the excitement is palpable. There’re new machines to come, process tweaks and process innovations, in-demand materials and as we detailed earlier this year, software developments aplenty too. Welcoming these efforts are Wabtec, Ford and many more industrial heavyweights, who see in binder jet technology a potential series production process. The determination of the machine vendors to reach that potential is clear for all to see. As is the pride of the company to first bring the technology to market.

“At ExOne, our team and R&D partners are really proud of the role we’ve all played in helping to evolve this now very active area of metal binder jetting,” ExOne CEO John Hartner told TCT. "After two decades, we now have a full family of production-ready metal printers, a vibrant market of competitors and interested industries, along with a stable of industrystandard materials, from 17-4PH to 6061 aluminum. [We] truly believe metal binder jetting has a unique role to play in delivering sustainable lightweight metal parts at high volumes that will make a difference to the world at large.”

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 017

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Tooling, jigs & fixtures

Senior Content Producer Sam Davies speaks to Mantle CEO Ted Sorom & CCO Paul DiLaura about the company's TrueShape technology.

F

or a company emerging from its stealth status with what it believes to be a disruptive technology, there is no greater validation than seeing investors put their hands in their pockets to support that initial thrust into the market. Except, perhaps, one of those investors being former Apple inventor Tony Fadell, and Tony Fadell saying that he wishes he had what Mantle is bringing to the table when he was working on the Nest, iPod and iPhone projects.

Quite understandably, it has buoyed the company, reinforcing its belief that its TrueShape technology is going to take months out of manufacturing development cycles and allow customers a much greater speed to market.

“Anyone that truly understands the product development process, what it takes to go from finished design and then to have everything slow to a halt as you have weeks, if not months, of time when it’s tooled up and you’re trying to get it right for manufacturing before you can get it to your customers, gets excited about what we’re doing,” Mantle CEO Ted Sorom begins. “Tony is an outsized figure that understands this. That’s why he invested in us and why he’s involved in the company because he understands that delivering speed and improvements to product quality in the manufacturing has a huge impact on the products we see around us.”

material printed in the shape of the part using a precise positioning system and extrusion print-head before the deposited layers are automatically shaped using high-speed cutting to enhance the surface finish and detail.

Parts are then heated to a temperature just below melting point inside a hightemperature furnace, before being fused into dense, solid components.

Mantle says its process adds higher precision in the part prior to sintering than many of its competitors, with its shrinkage rates closer to 9-11% compared to their 17-20%, and is capable of achieving ‘extremely smooth’ two-micron RA surface finishes without bead blasting or external finishing. Parts are typically ready for use once cleaned with soap and water.

It is this, the removal of arduous postprocessing steps and delivery of tooling components at quick speeds, that has drawn the interest of such big-name companies.

“We’re able to not just reduce the cost of new product introduction, but more importantly, speed products to market,” Sorom says. “That’s where the

TrueShape combines an extrusion additive manufacturing technique with subtractive finishing in a hybrid process. It sees Mantle’s Flowable Metal Paste

“We're able to not just reduce the cost but speed products to market.” major OEMs we’re working with get really excited, because folks like NASA, Apple, Tony Fadell, they have funds to be able to tool up their products, but they don’t have a way to speed up that cycle today and to dramatically improve the time to market.”

Currently, Mantle offers H13 and P2X (a P20-like material with improved corrosion and abrasion resistance) tool steel materials, placing its initial focus on high hardness tool steels with additional materials ‘relevant to the tooling industry’ in the pipeline. On the software side, Mantle’s offering can automatically process both the additive and subtractive components of the process, meaning users don’t have to swap between separate software packages to prepare their CAD/ CAM files. By doing this, Mantle believes it is offering a technology that covers the ‘hardest, most time-consuming and costly portion of the mold build’ and does it much faster than any other company can.

Though Mantle has been operating in stealth, it has already begun working with several manufacturers to put these claims to the test. Among them is leading cosmetics brand L’Oreal who has helped Mantle to

SHOWN: MEDICAL DEVICE MOLD PRODUCED WITH TRUESHAPE TECHNOLOGY

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Tooling, jigs & fixtures

“Lead time and cycle time drives their interest. If they can reduce lead time by weeks or months, that's a game-changer.” validate the technology through the printing of precision molds. As Mantle launched earlier this year, L’Oreal’s Director of Product Conception Blake Soeters was quoted as saying that TrueShape ‘delivered the dimensional tolerances and surface finish’ required and that the company is excited about the ‘positive impact this technology will have on our ability to rapidly bring new products to market.’

“The lead time and cycle time drives their interest,” Mantle Chief Commercial Officer Paul DiLaura says.

“If they can reduce lead time by weeks or months, that’s a game-changer for them. If they can go from six weeks to two weeks to get a unit mold or prototype tool or production tool made, they can compress that and launch it, hit a holiday season, for example. That has a huge impact.

Then [there’s the] cycle time.

They’re dealing with such high volumes that if they can reduce the amount of time it takes to produce the part and cycle through their molding process, it has a very big impact on their business.”

Another of Mantle’s early partners is an unnamed consumer appliance manufacturer who has used Mantle’s TrueShape technology to replace a plastic injection mold component that supported the manufacture of a dishwasher part. Using TrueShape, the part was produced with P2X material at a dimensional tolerance within 0.001” and in a timeframe of 46 hours (22 for the print, 24

for sintering). This was a 71% saving on the week-long lead time of the conventional method. What’s more, no additional surface finishing is said to have been required to achieve 2 µm Ra and the tool was used in a full production run of 200,000 units.

Having recorded only minor wear at ‘expected points’ the insert has been reinstalled for another production run of 200,000 units. To add to the time saving, the consumer appliance firm also achieved a 67% cost saving and is targeting the production of more than

500,000 units with the tool, which would match the expected lifetime of traditionally manufactured inserts.

A global medical device manufacturer, meanwhile, used TrueShape to produce cavity and core tool-steel mold inserts within a week: Two and a half days to print the parts, and five and a half days to prepare the mold and insert. Compared to a traditional lead time of seven weeks, this represented a time saving of more than 80%. Again using the P2X material, TrueShape delivered tight dimensional tolerances within 0.001” and a smooth matte surface finish of 1.6 µm Ra ‘similar to that found on parts after Electric Discharge Machining.’ Before being installed into the molding press, ejector pin holes and tap mounting holes were added. Once installed in the molding machine, parts were produced using Radel polyphenylsulfone (PPSU) at a mold temperature of 315°C and using acetal at a mold temperature of 199°C, with the resulting parts passing all visual and dimensional requirements.

In addition to consumer appliances and medical device manufacturers, Mantle is also targeting OEMs in the automotive and electronics spaces, while toolmakers and contractors are other obvious suitors for TrueShape.

The company has hinted that there will be more information on the ‘intimate use’ of TrueShape by ‘major OEMs’ to come later this year as it harnesses the $30m capital it has raised and seeks to fulfil its mission.

“While other people in additive are focused on these high-end applications that no normal consumer will ever see the result of – I mean, how many rockets have you stood next to or jet engines have you looked inside of recently? – I look around and there are injection molded consumer electronics, packaging, and products all around me every day,” Sorom finishes. “And this is a technology that will start to move additive manufacturing from prototyping and niche applications into having a huge impact on how the products that we all use every day are made and brought to market.”

SHOWN: MOLD TOOL PRODUCED WITH TRUESHAPE

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 021

DIGITAL THREAD

ADDITIVE IN CONTEXT

Laura speaks to Authentise about leveraging the digital thread.

A

s I alluded to in my Editor’s Letter at the top of this issue, the additive manufacturing (AM) industry enjoys a catchy bit of tech terminology. One example that has existed for some time but boasts many interpretations and components is the notion of the “digital thread”. So, when Authentise, a leader in process automation software for AM, described a recent partnership with Hexagon as a “step change” that will deliver an “integrated digital thread for additive manufacturing”, we figured we’d go straight to the source and ask, what exactly does that mean?

“The digital thread refers to the full history of the part as it's being produced,” Andre Wegner, CEO, Authentise told TCT. “That can be anything from the information about what happened to the part as it was being designed to the machine data to the environmental data of the material's storage locations - like how humid or hot was it there? Pretty much anything that we can possibly put our hands on that forms this full digital record.”

Additive is an inherently digital process, or at least it should be, from the design to the manufacture, and now, thanks to enhancements in automation, in those post-printing steps too. While there are several opportunities for data to be collected along that journey, the real value is in how manufacturers interpret and deploy that intelligence in future

“Contextual data is much more valuable.” production, something which Authentise refers to as “contextual data”.

“We're trying to differentiate the approach we're taking from the previous kind of Industry 4.0 initiatives that we've seen out there,” Wegner explained. “For me, at least in additive, we're not really generating enough bucket data that has real valuable impact, the only thing you can really do with bucket data or point data is to display dashboards or maybe provide predictive maintenance.

Contextual data or the digital thread differs from that because now we can relate the failure of a part to the material that was used, to the operator that designed the part in the first place. So, you have this full context of the part and that's what's really valuable, especially in a situation where we're not producing millions of the same part, we're only producing one or ten or hundreds of the same part, you don't have a lot of data points to compare so you really need to drive insight from the context.”

This is something that is being addressed in the collaboration with

Hexagon, an established provider of sensor, software and autonomous solutions. The two are said to be digitizing every step of the AM workflow down to quality assurance, plugging Hexagon’s tools into that contextual data to make AM more predictable, repeatable and traceable. For Wegner, the need for these kinds of solutions, for which he tells TCT that demand has soared, speaks to the ongoing maturity of the AM industry – and could provide a few lessons for more traditional manufacturing industries too.

“It's about helping the maturity,” Wegner said. “From where I stand, the level of insight we're talking about here is probably beyond the scope of a lot of very mature industries that we already know. Take, for example, the automotive industry, I don't think this is something that we need in order to productize hundreds of thousands of parts with additive. I think this is something that we need to reduce the cost of additive to the point where it can compete and produce higher volumes. This is something that we want to do in order to teach the rest of the industry how well it can be done. I always believe in additive being a kind of sandbox for traditional manufacturing, we have less legacy, we have more data and we should show people what value we can generate from that.”

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 023

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ADDITIVE ASSEMBLE

Sam Davies talks to BEAMIT Group General Manager Andrea Scanavini as the service provider continues to grow through acquisitions.

I

n late 2019, BEAMIT President Mauro Antolotti took the kind of call he gets numerous times a week. On the other end of the phone was the founder of a young company pitching its 3D printing post-processing services to the Italian service provider. Though Antolotti is no stranger to a sales pitch, they don’t normally play out as this one did.

Not only was Antolotti interested in buying the heat treatment and surface finishing services that PRES-X was offering, but

by January 2020 he had acquired a 25% stake in the company. It was the first of several business investments BEAMIT would make over the following 18 months, with PRES-X founder Andrea Scanavini leading their integration as BEAMIT Group General Manager from July 2020. In this role, he became responsible for taking the best practices and business models from each incoming company and reducing their weak points.

When announcing Scanavini as the new General Manager, Antolotti spelt out that the arrangement with PRES-X was just the first of multiple steps that would turn the company from a single entity into a group of companies. Scanavini said he was honored to be chosen for the role, that he believes the strength of a company lies with its people, and that between him and BEAMIT there was a mutual love for embracing, and then addressing, challenges.

Speaking to TCT almost a year on, he elaborated on what those challenges are.

“The first one is the technological development of the value chain,” Scanavini said. “We are addressing the innovation in all the phases of the value

chain, starting from the powders, where we work together with Sandvik to create specific powders for specific applications and then go into the printing process, cleaning, heat treatment and surface finishing, all integrated and digitally connected.

The second [challenge] is the cost. Our project has as a main target the cost reduction of additive manufacturing production, using specific processes that make all the phases shorter and cheaper; the concentration of all the phases inside the company and in the same factory in order to get the cost related to shipping, logistics and so on [reduced].”

BEAMIT’s first response to these challenges was to bring PRES-X under its umbrella. PRES-X’s offering features solutions that automatically remove powder and substrates from printed parts – including internal supports – in the same phase, as well as a solution that combines HIP and heat treatment cycles, which is said to eliminate porosity and internal defects, while also improving characteristics at the microstructural level. It also has a patented method for surface finishing - which again addresses the surfaces of cavities and internal components and offers functional validation tests of components at the end of the work cycle. The PRES-X business has also started offering DryLyte dry electropolishing technology after recently partnering with GPAINNOVA. Companies that have followed PRES-X into the BEAMIT Group include ZARE and 3T Additive Manufacturing. ZARE was acquired because of its machining capabilities and use of GE Additive machines (BEAMIT previously had metal 3D printing systems from EOS and SLM Solutions only), while 3T AM was brought into the business because of its geographic location, design for additive manufacturing proficiencies and familiarity with materials like copper alloys.

SHOWN: ROCKET PROPULSION CHAMBER PRINTED IN COPPER

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working with OEMs to make the printing process more sustainable ‘from the point of view of cost’, while the company is also exploring hybrid technologies. Sandvik’s materials development expertise is also set to play a big role in pursuing opportunities, with titanium 6242 being introduced earlier this year and aluminum 2024 and 7050 materials set to follow.

6 BELOW:

3D PRINTER IN OPERATION AT BEAMIT

“The strategy of BEAMIT Group is to become the leading company in the additive manufacturing market worldwide,” Scanavini explained. “All the acquisitions that we have in place, both the acquisitions we have done and the new ones that are coming, are not only territorial expansion, but also increasing our internal skills. We invest in different places, in different countries, in different equipment. [We] acquire specific companies that increase our capacities and insource specific skills and knowhow.”

Backing BEAMIT on this endeavour is Sandvik, who took up a 30% stake in the company in July 2019 with the option to increase its control over time. From a technical standpoint, the investment in BEAMIT gave Sandvik a ‘specialist partner’ with which it could work to help customers develop their application of metal additive manufacturing technology. And as they do so, Sandvik has control over one of Europe’s leading 3D printing service providers with the financial security to be a long-term collaborator.

“Thanks to strong capital injection in the BEAMIT Group, it allows BEAMIT to be unique with this financial strength. It makes BEAMIT secure from a financial point of view,” Scanavini said. “Additive manufacturing is a capital-intensive activity. If you don’t have money, you don’t go. And big OEMs are looking for a partner for new projects that will be on the market in the next 10/20 years. Thanks to Sandvik, BEAMIT can fit this requirement.”

In that timeframe, BEAMIT expects to be pursuing opportunities in the aerospace and defence markets, and potentially automotive too. To address the higher volume demands of industries like automotive, Scanavini says BEAMIT is

Meanwhile, the Osprey 2507 superduplex stainless steel co-launched by Sandvik and BEAMIT in April has already been used to develop a reinvented impeller in collaboration with Equinor and Norwegian Eureka Pumps. Several other ongoing projects in the marine sector are also using the material, which Sandvik says is ‘superiorly suitable for highly corrosive seawater and marine environments.’

BEAMIT is now eager to push on. The company recognizes that in order to allow and encourage OEMs to utilize 3D printing technology instead of a traditional manufacturing method, they need to innovate. In the optimization of stainless steel, titanium and aluminum materials; in the development of new printing processes; and in the acquisition of several companies, the BEAMIT Group believes it is doing just that.

“The BEAMIT mission is to be the company that makes additive manufacturing sustainable for mass production,” finished Scanavini. “Additive manufacturing is a sustainable process and digital process, but the cost is a key point. [AM] has strength points related to environmental sustainability, but not financial sustainability. This is the mission of BEAMIT Group and the solution that we see is the ‘one-stop shop’ as a first, and then three or four years in the future, we see a completely automatic and digital factory for additive manufacturing mass production.”

VOL 7 ISSUE 3 / www.tctmagazine.com / 027

REINTRODUCING Laura Griffiths speaks to Hubs CEO Bram de Zwart about the Protolabs acquisition and bringing manufacturing online.

“An online

I

n a packed conference room at CES 2015, 3D Hubs CEO Bram de Zwart was already thinking about the bigger picture, the promise that 3D printing could “change the way we manufacture and distribute products by creating a future where we make products very close to the end user and on demand.”

Back then, the Amsterdam founded start-up had already amassed the world’s largest network of 3D printers with thousands of machines, many of them desktop, registered on the platform. Today, it goes beyond 3D printing, with four manufacturing technologies now offered via its online network and around 145,000 engineers served.

“The vision remains the same,” de Zwart told TCT, reflecting on those early ambitions. “We believe that an online platform can accelerate the future of decentralized manufacturing, which we believe is a lot more efficient as it removes a lot of waste from transportation, inventory and overproduction and you can increase the utilization of manufacturing equipment around the globe.”

Since its founding in 2013, the company is said to have facilitated production of over 7 million custom parts and products through its instant quoting platform with industrial manufacturing

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platform can accelerate the future of decentralized manufacturing.” services in over 20 countries. Last year, the company continued its expansion with the opening of its third location in Europe following the setup of a regional HQ in Chicago and investment from Future Shape led by leading tech inventor Tony Fadell in 2019. Then, in January, the company entered into a new phase, spurred on by an acquisition by digital manufacturing leader Protolabs for a closing consideration of 280 million USD and shedding the ‘3D’ from its brand to become simply, Hubs.

“We collaborate where we see opportunities to learn from each other,” de Zwart said of the acquisition. “As Hubs, we bring a lot of experience with the online marketplace concept working with outside manufacturing partners.

Protolabs has a huge amount of manufacturing knowledge that we didn't have, we never [did] any of

the manufacturing ourselves, we were really focused on building the platform and then relied on our partners for manufacturing.

We as a team are learning a lot in that area as well and that allows us to make our platform better for our customers and manufacturing partners. […] I truly believe that one plus one can become three here.”

The combination of Protolabs’ established manufacturing capacity and Hubs’ platform experience will, according to Protolabs President and CEO Rob Bodor, allow the two to "fulfil nearly every custom manufacturing need across the product lifecycle." This ability to offer different manufacturing processes is something Hubs has been building on since it first turned its attention from desktop printer owners and consumers to a more industrialfocused approach, and now sees the network providing not only 3D

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HUBS’ ONLINE MANUFACTURING NETWORK HAS FACILITATED PRODUCTION OF OVER 7 MILLION CUSTOM PARTS

printing but also CNC machining, sheet metal fabrication and injection molding across its 240 certified manufacturing partners.

different continents which allows us to smartly reroute orders if needed due to things like global pandemics but also other things like escalating trade wars, national holidays, natural disasters,” de Zwart said. “There can be many reasons in supply chain why you want to shift some of your production elsewhere, at least temporarily, and that's something that we enable.”

“3D printing is often just a component in a larger assembly if you're moving towards end parts and not just prototyping,” de Zwart explained. “It's just a much better experience for customers if they can use us as a one stop shop. They can get all of their part needs fulfilled by us instead of having to go to different suppliers or platforms. By doing this, we can also help the customer a little bit and guide them in the right direction because they may not always know what is the right technology or material for their particular application.”

That said, 3D printing is still a big part of Hubs’ offering. According to Hubs’ annual AM trend report, 54% of engineering businesses said they increased their usage of 3D printing for functional end-use parts in 2020 while 30% maintained their usage that year. This year, however, 73% of those surveyed predict they will produce or source even more 3D printed parts compared to 2020. Given this growing trend towards production and recent emphasis on challenges in supply chain, de Zwart’s comments from his 2015 presentation suddenly feel more relevant than ever.

“The vulnerability of supply chains was exposed quite clearly and I think people start realizing the benefits of the manufacturing network model that we have, where we have manufacturing partners in 20 different countries on three

De Zwart elaborated to say that this flexibility can be particularly valuable to SMEs: “Larger enterprises, they probably have the resources to build these supply chains themselves but small to medium sized businesses, they often don't. So that's where we can come in very handy. We have already built that. We have strong relationships with these premium manufacturing partners and so they don't have to build that, they can get the same supply chain resilience as a large enterprise without the investment.”

But de Zwart believes there’s also another trend that has been brought to the forefront, and that is the shift towards B2B commerce and the digitization of the manufacturing market, something the co-founder is as enthusiastic about today as he was back in that conference room in 2015.

“The market is moving online,” de Zwart concluded. “Manufacturing is a massive industry but it's one of the last ones to really go through this transition and I think it's going to be really exciting.”

Customize your own automated post processing cell today!

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HANS LANGER X Two entrepreneurs with companies founded in Munich, Germany sit down to discuss the future of design and manufacturing.

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n the first episode of a new Additive Insight Podcast series called Innovators on Innovators, EOS founder Hans Langer [HL] joined Hyperganic CEO Lin Kayser [LK] to offer insights on the developments and challenges surrounding the additive manufacturing (AM) industry today.

The below excerpt of the conversation touches on the pair’s beginnings in the 3D printing space, the development of a rocket engine application with EOS printing technology & Hyperganic’s software, and how they believe AM can emulate the development of the semiconductor space.

LK: I think one of the challenges that additive still has, most people still have that image in their minds that this is great for prototypes, etc, but it's nothing for serial production. It's too expensive, it's too slow, the material quality is not there. And these days are long gone. This is what fascinated me.

I've been doing software for 40 years now, and for me for the software was always one of the most creative things that you could do, software always moves fast, PC technology always moves fast. But the rest of the world cannot move very slowly.

And I always ask myself, why is the rest of the world moving so slowly when I'm used to this incredible speed? The new PC is actually faster, and you can do more stuff and software just builds on top of each other, always improves. This seems not to be happening in the real world.

And when I got a 3D printer in 2012, I realized this is a tool where we can bring the software paradigm into manufacturing.

Then I say, ‘okay Lin, you're kidding yourself,’ because I had this FDM printer which produced horrible parts. Then I discovered this whole world of industrial 3D printing, and that's where my eyes opened, I said, ‘wait a second, this has the potential to be the manufacturing method that we can use to create revolutionary parts.’ And now we need a software ecosystem for that. That was kind of my thinking that eventually started the idea for Hyperganic.

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HL: I came out of the laser world, manufacturing with lasers. Parallel to EOS, we started SCANLAB, which is a world market leader today in laser-based digital manufacturing. This is far more than additive. Just to give you an idea, at EOS we use around 1,000 scan heads per year. But General Scanning is shipping 50,000 scan heads per year and companies like Foxconn, they use more than 10,000 of our systems just to manufacture iPhones. This gives you a little bit of perspective on where this thing could move.

Foxconn still uses around 100,000 CNC machines. And when they got the order from Apple to manufacture the iPhone, they SHOWN: ROCKET ENGINE DESIGNED IN HYPERGANIC SOFTWARE

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HYPERGANIC CEO LIN KAYSER

purchased 5,000 CNC machines per quarter. I thought this is an interesting proposal for additive because an additive machine, at the end of the day, is much more functional than a CNC machine.

LK: I mean, I think that's one of the things that people often forget: manufacturing is so unbelievably big.

You're very happy with the growth rates of additive at this time, we are very happy with the adoption of our software in the industry, but we're just scratching the surface of manufacturing at this point. Additive is like nothing, but I think we both believe very clearly that additive is going to play a huge role in manufacturing, it is going to play maybe the biggest role in manufacturing in the long run. That is of course a path, you have to go there.

“We are opening a new chapter where we go into a totally different world.”

And the interesting thing is that we both see this parallel between what happened in the production of computer technology, especially microchips, and what is now happening in additive. In microchips you had this very interesting combination of the software side that designed more and more advanced chips in a completely new way, in an algorithmic way and not in a manual way.

And then on the other side, you had the evolution of the manufacturing process itself, finer details, improved structures, etc. And they evolved in combination, but each of them kind of separately, and each informed the other. But both of them could evolve independently, and that sped everything up. So, everything became much faster. And we are kind of seeing the same thing happening now in additive, would you agree with that?

HL: 100%. Because I had a highlight in, I think it was five years ago, I was reading the newspaper, and they were writing that [Qualcomm] had never manufactured a chip. It was reported that there was a chip company in Taiwan that had made the chips and I looked at Taiwan semiconductor manufacturing and I was very impressed

with the semiconductor industry - and semiconductor for me is additive manufacturing, they do it layer by layer.

Everybody is talking about additive manufacturing and is thinking this tiny market is additive manufacturing.

Let's look at a similar market, the semiconductor industry, and just to give you an idea, I mean, this Taiwan semiconductor manufacturing today is worth 600 billion. 600 billion. And they started about the same time when EOS was started. And I said, maybe we can look at the development of this market in a comparable way.

And then I ask you a question because I didn't understand what the core of your software really was. It's a voxel-based system. And I'm a physicist, I always look to real results as real world. I mean, there is a digital world, but we have to make the transfer from the digital world into the real world. And this is always materials.

You remember, we had this dinner at the restaurant near us, with my son, Uli. This was in 2018. And Uli said, ‘why don't we make a rocket engine part?’ and then then I said, ‘okay, Uli take care, we had created AM Ventures, we had a very ambitious team there with very specific knowledge between software and hardware’. And, we said, ‘let's rent an EOS machine and put the data from Lin on this machine.’

And this was not so easy, because the standard EOS interface didn't allow it. So, we created a special interface for you on this test machine and after 63 hours, I remember very well, we had a part in our hands that was created by a computer, and we had never seen a design of it before.

For me this was clear, now we are opening a new chapter. We are opening a new chapter that could probably develop like the one in the semiconductor industry, where we go into a totally different world.

The full Innovators on Innovators episode can be found at: http://mytct.co/AI-Langer-Kayser

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Expert Column

AN AM PROBLEM SHARED… Words: Dr Candice Majewski, The University of Sheffield

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henever I think about where I am now in my career, I always laugh at how much luck played a part at every stage! From a career advisor sending me down the route of a Mechanical Engineering degree, a guest lecture on ‘Rapid Prototyping’ towards the end of that degree, and a new Master’s course starting in that area just as I was finishing, everything just kind of fell into place.

Somehow, 20ish years (where did that time go?) after first hearing about it, I’ve ended up here in Sheffield as an academic, leading a team of technical and research staff and students focused mainly around powderedpolymer additive manufacturing (AM).

But what’s the big draw? It’s not ‘being an academic’ (although it’s a pretty cool job anyway), it’s much more about being an academic specializing in AM. The thing that first inspired me about this whole field was the way it had so many applications across different areas, and being an academic lets me explore those areas and take my team’s research in pretty much whatever direction we think seems interesting. I’m lucky enough to have a team of technical staff, researchers and PhD students who are

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all as excited by AM as I am, which makes a really good environment for throwing ideas around and trying new things.

I also get to teach our Undergraduate and Masters students all about AM. I think most educators would agree there’s a great pleasure in getting to introduce people to something you’re really passionate about and seeing them start to develop that same passion. It’s a genuine source of joy to me that a decent number of my ex-students have gone on into careers in AM, and of course they’re an excellent source of advice for any of our current students who might be considering doing the same!

In general, I really think this is an exciting time for people wanting to move into this area, and not just the ‘usual suspects’. Because here’s the thing... although the AM industry is getting bigger, it still feels quite small and friendly.

Many of the people who’ve been around for a while genuinely care about sharing their experience and expertise, and about welcoming new people into the area. And slowly but surely, we’re starting to draw in more people from a whole host of complementary areas, who are

bringing with them a great diversity of ideas and techniques. Just within my own circle of collaborators we have microbiologists, tribologists, material scientists, machine learning folk, statisticians, archaeologists, human interaction specialists and plenty more. In her column last September, Alex Kingsbury talked about the importance of the team in bringing together an event, and I think the same is true at a broader scale for us as an industry.

Bringing together people from different backgrounds and different application sectors can only help us develop more quickly and effectively. Perhaps they can offer solutions to some of the problems we need to overcome in AM or help us make sure we’re not missing anything obvious and trying to fix things that have already been fixed elsewhere. In some cases, it’s even more simple, and we just need a different viewpoint. I doubt she’d even remember it, but I have a vivid memory of telling Professor Eileen Harkin-Jones that we needed better temperature control on polymer sintering systems because thermal variations affect our mechanical properties. Her response of ‘or we just need materials that don’t care about thermal variations’ stuck with me ever since; another perspective that really helped me consider different alternatives.

Whichever way you look at it I think the bigger the variety of people we can attract into AM, the better and stronger we can become. So, I hope that, as the industry continues to evolve, we hold onto that ‘small-town feel’ and keep on welcoming new people from across different sectors and backgrounds.

Outside of that, what’s my personal wish for the future? Enough research questions left unanswered to keep me going until I can retire to a big old house in the countryside with my husband and our dog!