The Story of Strati: 3D Printing

On Sunday, Sept. 7, 2014, in Chicago, something started before the opening of IMTS – The International Manufacturing Technology Show in the Emerging Technology Center (ETC) that has reverberated through our industry ever since. A group from industry, a government national laboratory, tech and AMT got together to do something that had never been done — print a drivable car at IMTS.

Bonnie Gurney, AMT vice president, strategic content and partnerships now; AMT director of communications then: “We were absolutely confident, or maybe 95%, it was going to happen.”

Jay Rogers, CEO of Haddy Inc. now; co-founder and CEO of Local Motors then: “It was like a moon shot. And until you land on the moon, you haven’t done it.”

Rick Neff, CEO of Rick Neff LLC now; manager of market development for Cincinnati Inc. then: “That Sunday morning, when we started the machine, no one could look you in the eye and say that it would work.”

When all was said and done, the team accomplished what had previously been unthinkable: They built the first 3D printed car in the world, the Strati. The Strati was a remarkable success, even going on to appear on the “Today” show. It has since helped drive the entire additive industry to where it is today.

Looking back, Lonnie Love (who was the corporate fellow at the Manufacturing Demonstration Facility at Oak Ridge National
Laboratory at the time) says there was something else needed to create the Strati on the floor of McCormick Place in 2014 — to do something that had never been done before with a technology that we now take as a given, but which then simply wasn’t ready for prime time: “It was an amazing team of industry and government working together. But we needed that stress of IMTS. We needed a hard deadline, failure not an option, high profile ... If we fail, we look like idiots — which we probably were, but it was a hell of a lot of fun.”

In the decade since that remarkable IMTS, the AMT ETC has continued pushing the boundaries of manufacturing technology. It has featured such moon shots as a carbon fiber-printed house; technologies underpinning the Giant Magellan telescope; and a space habitat designed as a living and working environment for astronauts and researchers living on the moon and Mars.

Still, among such exciting exhibitions and achievements, the Strati stands tall. This year’s ETC features Apollo, Apptronik’s AI-powered general purpose humanoid robot; an integrated multiprocess convergent manufacturing cell; technologies pushing the boundaries of submarine construction; and a film on creating a model-based engineering environment.

At IMTS 2024, to celebrate its 10-year anniversary, Gurney, Love, Neff and Rogers will reunite on stage. Make sure to visit IMTS.com/Register to catch up with the Strati crew, see the Strati and explore what future technologies will be unveiled in the ETC this year. IMTS 2024 takes place Sept. 9-14 at McCormick Place in Chicago, Illinois.

Read the full history here: AMTonline.org/article/the-story-of-strati-3d-printing-a-car.