Production

Niche Manufacturer Discovers How Additive and Amazon Go Together

The economics of 3D printing allow for cost-effective production of niche products, and Amazon Prime offers a way to distribute them. The Periscope Case is one company’s first venture into an all-new model aimed at bringing products to market that would never have been profitable before.

March 6, 2019 - Peter Zelinski

Videos

Video: How Additive Manufacturing Is Advancing the Space Industry

By making launch vehicles more efficient and easier to manufacture, AM lets small companies play a significant role in space. Here is a conversation with an aspiring startup.

March 4, 2019 - Peter Zelinski

Production

Video: Production Additive Manufacturing Is Coming

Additive systems are proving capable for cost-effective production even of parts that aren’t all that complex. This will be the next phase of AM.

February 25, 2019 - Peter Zelinski

Design for Additive

AM Brings Down the Wall Between Manufacturing and Design

In additive manufacturing, design and manufacturing blend together. They can’t be separate if AM is to realize its promise.

January 28, 2019 - Peter Zelinski

Prototyping

Update on Evolve: Ensuring Repeatability, Reliability and Speed for Scale Production

Engineering the machine and process to work as consistently as production hardware ought to perform is where the company says its efforts have been focused.

December 17, 2018 - Peter Zelinski

Metal AM

Video: Redesigned Milling Cutter Demonstrates Design Possibilities of AM

Topology optimization plus a material change realize an 80 percent reduction in mass.

December 10, 2018 - Peter Zelinski

Polymer AM

Video: In Additive Manufacturing, Material Engineering Is Also Needed for Supports

The sacrificial material affects the quality of 3D printing and the efficiency of the process. That's why material developers direct attention toward the material that gets thrown away.

December 5, 2018 - Peter Zelinski

10 Impressions of Formnext 2018

The size and scope of this year's Formnext exhibition offered plenty to see, but also reinforced additive manufacturing's continuing maturity. 10 impressions from Additive Manufacturing editors.

November 19, 2018 - Stephanie Hendrixson, Peter Zelinski

Production

Economies of Scope: Additive Manufacturing’s Trajectory Toward Bigness

A new book argues that the advance of AM will ultimately favor bigger and bigger manufacturers. Recent articles about groups and companies seeking to benefit from AM show a tiny trajectory in the same direction.

November 16, 2018 - Peter Zelinski

Moldmaking

New Kimura U.S. Metal Casting Plant Relies Entirely on 3D Printing for Molds and Cores

Printing foundry molds and cores without hard tooling will speed leadtimes and make small quantities of castings affordable, the company says. Its proprietary process advances the detail and finish obtainable from casting using sand 3D printing.

November 14, 2018 - Peter Zelinski

Production

5 Lessons About Additive Manufacturing We Can Learn from This Part

A bracket redesign has a lot to say about the successful application of metal AM. One of the takeaways: Support structures are worth the effort!

October 19, 2018 - Peter Zelinski

Tooling

The Manufacturing Network as a Source for Internal Custom Tooling

For a tool that includes both machined and 3D-printed components, all the pieces of the tool can be made by separate companies yet arrive together. BMW has used Xometry to obtain tooling in this way.

October 17, 2018 - Peter Zelinski