At the form next event in Frankfurt last winter, the MetalFAB1 from Additive Industries made its big debut. Though the machine was not physically present, attendees were treated to a virtual reality presentation of the massive and potentially game-changing metal 3D printer. With already impressive claims of “10x better reproducibility, productivity and flexibility” in comparison to other metal 3D-printing technologies, the MetalFAB1 just received another big boost to its performance as the first industrial 3D printer to incorporate first-of-its-kind simulation software from 3DSIM.
The MetalFAB1 system is equipped with automated build plate, product and powder handling, as well as multiple build chambers so that four different materials can be used within a single machine, without cross-contamination or extended downtime for changing out metal powders. These features enable increased autonomy in the 3D printer, but continuous in-process calibration and quality control may be even more important given the consistency issues related to metal 3D printing. On Apr. 5, at the Additive Manufacturing Users Group Conference, Additive Industries made an announcement that signals even greater quality assurance in the MetalFAB1 system through the use of 3DSIM’s exaSIM and FLEX software.
Typically, in metal 3D printing, a laborious process of trial and error is performed with an additive manufacturing system until the user finds the exact parameters with which to print an object with consistent repeatability. Oftentimes, this limits the user to dedicate a machine to manufacturing with a single material, if not a specific object. GE has, for instance, established a 3D printing factory in Alabama with numerous systems devoted to the production of their LEAP jet engine nozzle. Because GE is a multibillion-dollar conglomerate, such an allocation of resources might be justified for this important component, but the ends certainly don’t justify the means for smaller operations. More importantly, if metal 3D printing is ever to achieve widespread adoption, the quality control associated with traditional manufacturing techniques will need to be achieved. In steps 3DSIM.
3DSIM is a University of Louisville spin off founded by Brent Stucker, whose work now serves as the basis for an advanced suite of print preview programs for metal 3D printing. The cloud-based software uses existing data related to the interactions between energy, such as a laser beam (or four CO2 lasers in the case of the MetalFAB1), and materials, such as titanium powder, and simulates accurate meshes of 3D objects. This process may sound simple, but the physics associated with a heat source in a gas chamber turning solid dust into liquid metal is not simple. In fact, 3DSIM suggests that the mathematics required to make such a prediction would take 5.7 x1018 years to solve on a 16-teraflop computer. 3DSIM, however, has managed to develop a program that can do this work rapidly using advanced algorithms.
By inputting a 3D model into 3DSIM’s FLEX software, users can determine what will happen when the laser hits the dust and actually sets about turning it into a solid. While FLEX can determine the sort of porosity, part distortion and surface roughness an object might have, exaSIM is a separate program that generates optimized support structures for a metal part to reduce material waste and ensure a proper print.
3DSIM is currently open to beta testers for their software, but Additive Industries is now the first company to make use of this print simulation technology. They have incorporated FLEX and exaSIM into their own Additive World platform, software developed for the MetalFAB1 3D printer. As Additive Industries already sold out of all of its beta machines in just three months this year, to customers as important as Airbus, it would be of little surprise to hear that it will sell out of its next batch of production systems as well.
About the Author
Michael Molitch-Hou is a 3D printing specialist and the founder of The Reality™ Institute, a service institute dedicated to determining what’s real and what’s not so that you don’t have to. He is a graduate of the MFA critical studies and writing program at CalArts, and a firm advocate of world peace.