by Melissa Donovan
Additive manufacturing (AM) has roots in the aerospace industry and continues to show a great presence there today. The October issue of Industrial Print magazine includes editorial on popular three-dimensional (3D) printing processes used in aerospace/aeronautics and why. Here, we share information on leading vendors offering products in this space.
Catering to Aerospace
3D Systems’ incarnation of the laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) process is referred to direct metal printing, or DMP. For aerospace, the relevant systems are the mid-frame DMP Factory 350 and large-frame DMP Factory 500 systems. The DMP process uses a low O2/Interstitial environment, which gives you a great surface finish, good chemistry, and properties in the components, and best-in-class powder re-use characteristics, according to the company. The medium frame system has a large build volume for a mid-frame, either a 275x275x420 millimeter (mm) or 350 mm3 build module thatcan be interchanged easily. The systems with the Flex powder handling system also have quick and efficient material swaps. The DMP Factory 500 system also features the low O2 print environment and is a proven, efficient system for the production of turbine engine and space hardware.
Fabrisonic ultrasonic additive manufacturing (UAM) relies on a solid-state welding technique that occurs at less than 200 degrees Fahrenheit. Additionally, UAM combines additive and subtractive processes to create complex metal parts. It uses ultrasonic welding to bond thin layers of metal foil without melting, preserving the material’s properties and enabling the integration of dissimilar materials. Additionally, UAM allows for the embedding of sensors and other components directly into metal parts, which is not possible with traditional AM methods. Fabrisonic offers several platform machines, and can design and build custom UAM machines to achieve customers’ requirements.
Among the main Prima Additive systems aimed at the aerospace sector are the LPBF Print Genius 400 machine platform, which in its XL version can reach a working area of 430x430x1000 mm. This platform can be configured with two or four lasers with the option of using not only infrared lasers, but also “green” lasers to work even more effectively on pure copper or the most challenging copper alloys, thanks to a short wavelength that allows for greater quality and repeatability on these materials. From the point of view of direct energy deposition technology, however, the most suitable solutions are those of the Laserdyne platform, both the Laserdyne 811 and the Laserdyne 795. Thanks to their extreme precision, these platforms allow for the production of large components from scratch with diameters of even more than a meter. It is an ideal solution for building, for example, nozzles for satellite launchers, thanks also to the laser head with a thin spot, which allows for the creation of walls with a thickness of up to one mm.
Sciaky, Inc.’s electron beam AM technology offers the highest deposition rates, and largest build envelopes among the metal AM processes. This process uses a lower cost material input (wire) that is available from the welding supply chain. This technology can build larger parts at a fast rate of production while having exceptional metal quality.
TRUMPF Inc.’s entire line of TruPrint metal 3D printers are suitable for aerospace applications. The TruPrint 1000, TruPrint 2000, TruPrint 3000, and TruPrint 5000 all offer process monitoring capabilities as well as OPCUA connectivity. These features allow for tracking machine repeatability, sending sensor data to external applications for analysis, and helping prevent quality issues. With 500 degrees Celsius preheating, the TruPrint 5000 is unique in the industry. It allows the user to preheat the build plate up to 500 degrees Celsius. This enables users to print materials previously known to crack or warp during processing, such as titanium parts built in Ti6242. The TruPrint 300 and TruPrint 5000 both have exchangeable cylinders, which allow for easier material handling as well as performing post-processing operations in parallel with production. Exchanging cylinders allows users to quickly remove a build from the machine and prepare it for the next build. This also allows users to change materials more quickly to support production needs.
Velo3D provides a fully integrated LPBF solution that combines hardware and software to achieve copy-exact repeatability from machine to machine. Once a part is printed and qualified on one machine, the print file can easily be exported to other printers to produce identically performing parts on those machines. This can be done with reduced requalification on each additional printer, unlocking the repeatability required to achieve distributed manufacturing and digital inventories. The Sapphire XC 1MZ provides customers with a larger build volume to print much larger parts, increasing the printers addressable use cases.
From LPBF to UAM, a number of technologies are available when it comes to considering a printer for aerospace end use.
Oct2024, Industrial Print Magazine
