America Awards Research Funding to Colorado School of Mines

America Makes has awarded $250,000 in research funding to the Colorado School of Mines (CSOM) with funding provided by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), through a recent project call for Methods for AM Cross-Platform Consistency (AM-CPC).

The AM-CPC Project Call is a collaboration between NIST, the Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) and America Makes to advance measurement science research for the reproducibility of additive manufacturing (AM) processes. Proposals for this project call were expected to outline neutral manufacturing plans to foster an understanding of consistency for multiple metal laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) machines, help accelerate AM process qualification and deliver a measurement method specification that may be used for analyzing various LPBF equipment.

Led by CSOM and Associate Professor Dr. Joy Gockel, the project team will consist of 3D Systems, Aconity 3D, AddUp, EOS North America, Concept Laser (GE Additive Company), Open Additive, Renishaw, Velo3D and Xact Metal. The proposed project aims to address the challenge of qualifying AM processes for commercial and defense applications by investigating cross-platform consistency in LPBF technologies.

The team will engage with nine different LPBF original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) to develop a neutral manufacturing plan to establish consistency across platforms and determine methods for analyzing and improving the consistency of LPBF processes.

Results from this project, expected to be completed in January of 2025, will provide the industrial supply chain with the knowledge of cross-platform printing capability for broad implementation with data made available to America Makes members.

“We congratulate the Colorado School of Mines and project team participants on their forward-thinking collaborative approach,” says Brandon Ribic, Ph.D., America Makes technology director. “We are thrilled to once again have the opportunity to collaborate with such a knowledgeable group of individuals from academia, industry and government who share our mission of accelerating the adoption of additive manufacturing.”

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• Dr. Joy Gockel, Associate Professor at the Colorado School of Mines, will be speaking at Formnext Forum Austin. Don’t miss her program on, “Workforce Development Needs and Opportunities in AM,” on Tuesday, August 29 at 10:45 a.m.