LIA NEWS
didn’t do this to make it lighter or cheaper or faster but to prove the technology.’
l South Africa’s Aerosud, which makes parts for Boeing, Airbus and others, says its Aeroswiſt project will grow titanium aerospace parts measuring 2 metres by 0.6 metres by 0.6 metres;
lAustralia’s RMIT University opened a $25 million AM precinct in 2011, said the school’s Milan Brandt. Te research and teaching facility is geared to supporting local companies transitioning to new manufacturing technologies. ‘For Australia, we have to look at niche markets; we can’t compete globally with the US or Europe,’ Brandt said. Among RMIT’s projects are efforts to repair Australia’s aging US-made aircraſt, as well as assessing the laser direct manufacture of small-scale, high-value components for a joint-strike fighter plane. While working on aircraſt parts like landing wheels, engine mounts and rudder anti-rotation brackets, RMIT has also partnered with an orthopaedic surgeon who performs surgery on cancerous bones and provides just-in-time bone-specific implants; and
business aſter building its CLAD five-axis AM machine with two clad heads (1 mm and 2.2 mm). Te CLAD machine, which features Precitec process monitoring with four photodiodes, can achieve deposition rates up to five metres per minute and has been used for repairing knife edges on sealing rings for a Pratt & Whitney turbofan engine. Aſter validating the two-hour-per-part process with metallurgical examination and fluorescent penetration inspection, the technology was transferred to a company called BeAM, and more than 600 parts have repaired with the process. ‘Te biggest challenge is getting our designers
not shy about investing significant time and money towards AM
Key players are
and engineers to think away from conventional, classical machining,’ Rockstroh urged. Ingomar Kelbassa of RWTH Aachen University echoed the theme: ‘We need a new generation of engineers who can think additively.’ Kelbassa and others also called attention to a pressing need for AM-specific
l France’s Irepa Laser, a technical centre for industrial laser applications, demonstrated how it spurred technology transfer to a spinoff
powders tailored to the demands of contemporary 3D printing. When asked what the next big application might be, Rockstroh pointed to medicine: ‘I think they are going to stay ahead as the FDA starts certifying use of those implants in the States. Tat’s the nice thing about cobalt chrome: it works in our fuel nozzle, and the
DIARY
Lasers for Manufacturing Event (LME): 23-24 September, 2014, Schaumburg, IL USA
International Congress on Applications of Lasers & Electro-Optics (ICALEO): 19-23 October, 2014, San Diego, CA USA
Laser Additive Manufacturing (LAM) Workshop: 4-5 March, 2015, Orlando, FL USA
International Laser Safety Conference (ILSC): 23-26 March, 2015, Albuquerque, NM USA
medical industry keeps the (powder) price relatively low. I don’t see, at least on the metals side, anybody taking over the volume of the medical industry; that’s going to be the next mushroom.’
APPLICATIONS AND MATERIALS Examples of strides toward a new paradigm in manufacturing for the 21st century were exhibited by, among others, Germany’s Fruth Innovative Technology (FIT), Michigan’s Linear Mold and Engineering and the Quad City Manufacturing Laboratory on the Rock Island Arsenal in Rock Island, IL. FIT, which is reducing data file sizes by
focusing on 2.5D imaging vs. 3D, can deliver custom implants to patients in Europe in three days – for example, for a motorcyclist with a fractured jaw. Presenter David Schafer said targeted handling of production information has
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