ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING FOR DEFENSE
Additive Manufacturing (AM), more widely known as 3D-printing, is a technology that can benefit the defense industry by enabling the ability for rapid, delocalized and flexible manufacturing of parts that have been cost-prohibitive to produce in the past. Complex parts are usually handled as a hybrid in defense applications, were parts are built to near net shapes and then are accurately machined to specification for functionality.
AM offers the opportunity to be able to disperse the supply chain and address some of the legacy systems in use for defense today. With potential to increase performance, reduce cost, and deploy more advanced engineering techniques. Other applications include weight distribution systems for the human body, light-weighting and part consolidation.
DEFENSE APPLICATIONS
SATELLITE BRACKETS
Launching satellites is expensive and every once of weight savings is worth thousands of dollars. By designing parts for minimal weight, while maintaining maximum strength, the resultant geometries can be complex. Additive manufacturing makes these parts manufacturable.
HUMAN AUGMENTATION SYSTEMS (HAS)
The demands on today’s soldier are ever-increasing. Exoskeletal systems offer freedom of movement with the assistance of a robotic-type shell made up of strong, lightweight material worn by the soldier to assist them with carrying larger loads. Additive manufacturing allows designers to utilize high strength to weight ratio material such as titanium and organic shaped geometries to build these extremely strong and lightweight systems.
RAPID PROTOTYPING
In the defence market devices are often only required in low volumes where quantities won’t allow the amortisation of tooling investment across the production run. Additive manufacturing allows for personal customization, improved part functionality, and reduction of part development time.
ROCKET ENGINE COMPONENTS
The extremely high firing temperatures and pressures experienced by rocket engine components require the parts to have complex cooling strategies and geometries. Additive manufacturing allows for the incorporation of critical cooling channels in the design to ensure its integrity during flight.
AIRCRAFT LIGHTWEIGHTING
Designers have extremely powerful software at their fingertips to design topology optimized lightweight structures. Conventional manufacturing methods could not take advantage of the resultant complex geometries. The part cost would outweigh the benefit of the weight savings. With additive manufacturing, these parts can be manufactured quickly, efficiently, and cost-effectively.
REPAIR PARTS
As assets age, the supply chain may no longer be available to address repair part needs. Additive manufacturing is well positioned to respond quickly to the lower volume demand of the defence industry. Digital files can also be sent around the globe and manufacture the parts locally, versus relying on the traditional centralized manufactured hub model. This ensures assets can be maintained cost effectively with the highest level of uptime required for critical equipment.
NOT SURE WHERE TO START?
WE’RE HERE TO HELP
From the initial phase of a project, our engineering team can consult with you to help optimize your part or product to realize the full benefits of additive manufacturing. Whether your next step is 510k approval, or manufacturing planning for serial production, we have the experience you need to get to market laser fast.
We have invested in the listed software to allow us to consult on projects on a more advanced level. We have the simulation and optimization software needed to do research and development projects.
More importantly than investing in our technology, we have invested in the people who make our engineering consulting services come together. Our highly trained and experienced engineers are thought leaders in the additive manufacturing industry. From CAD modeling and engineering, all the way through manufacturing, get our engineering team working for you!
| Altair HyperWorks Desktop | solidThinking Inspire and Evolve | Materialise 3-maticSTL |
| Altair HyperWorks Solvers – Optistruct & RADIOSS | SolidWorks with Simulation Premium | Moldex3D |
| Altair SIMLAB | Siemens NX | AcuSolve CFD Solutions |
