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The latest advancement in this area comes from engineers at Cornell University, who have discovered a way to control grain size and morphology in multiprincipal element alloys (MPEAs) during the metal AM process.

“A major problem is that most of the materials we print form column-like structures that can weaken the material in certain directions,” said Atieh Moridi in a press release. “We discovered that by adjusting the composition of the alloys, we can essentially disrupt these column-like structures and make a more uniform material.” Moridi is assistant professor in the Sibley School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and senior author of the published research.

By adjusting the relative amounts of manganese and iron in their starting material, Moridi and her team team disrupted columnar grain growth, significantly reduced grain size, and improved the yield strength of the finished metal.

“Microstructural features, like grain size, are the building blocks that govern material performance and properties” Moridi said. “The material composition controls the phase stability, which was the key for us to control the microstructure.”

“The difficult part was trying to resolve these very short spans of time where the material goes from liquid state to solid state,” explained first author Akane Wakai. The team overcame this roadblock by utilizing the Cornell High Energy Synchrotron Source (CHESS) to obtain fraction-of-a-second data about their materials during the printing process. In the best-performing sample, the researchers found evidence of an intermediate phase that can help disrupt those column-like grains and refine the grain structure.

“The findings from this research can be used for real-life applications to create more reliable materials that enable even better performance,” Wakai said. “Not too far into the future, we’ll start seeing 3D printed metal parts, even in consumer products like cars or electronics.”

The research is published in the journal Nature Communications.

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But why stop there?

Given the advantages AM generally enjoys over traditional manufacturing methods – more complex geometries, better strength-to-weight ratios, less material consumption – why not send the 3D printers themselves into space and take it to the next level?

If we’re ever going to see space-based manufacturing become a reality, it will surely have to be additive. Before getting into why that is, it’s worth looking back on the history of 3D printing in space thus far.

A brief history of space-based 3D printing

It may come as a surprise that we’ve had 3D printers in space for over a decade now, with the first installation from Made in Space (now Redwire Space) aboard the International Space Station (ISS) dating all the way back to 2014. That was part of NASA’s In-Space Manufacturing (ISM) project, which included an examination of the effects of microgravity on the fused filament fabrication (FFF) process. Results show no significant differences between FFF parts produced in space and those printed on Earth.

Moreover, one of the parts printed on the ISS, a wrench, demonstrated that astronauts could use a 3D printer to create parts based on designs sent remotely from Earth. A second 3D printer, dubbed the Additive Manufacturing Facility (AMF), was installed to test components made from various materials, including engineered plastics. Beyond test parts, the AMF has also printed functional items, including an antenna part and an adaptor to hold a probe in an air outlet on the station’s oxygen generation system.

In 2019, astronauts aboard the ISS installed the ReFabricator, a 3D printer developed by Tethers Unlimited (now a subsidiary of Arka) designed to recycle waste plastic, including 3D printed items, into 3D printing filaments. The Made in Space Recycler was installed that same year to investigate which materials are most useful for recycling.

One of the most ambitious projects for 3D printing in space – Archinaut One – began in 2017 with Made in Space printing test parts inside a thermal vacuum chamber. The result was a Guinness World Record for the longest 3D printed non-assembled piece: a 37.7 m beam. This proof of concept led to a plan to build a 3D printer capable of operating in orbit that would be installed in a pod attached to the outside of the ISS. The pod would use a robotic arm to help fabricate, assemble and repair structures in space.

Made in Space won the NASA contract for Archinaut One in 2019 and the spacecraft passed its Critical Design Review in 2022. However, NASA announced in 2023 that it would conclude the project without proceeding to a flight demonstration and instead maintain the project data for unspecified future efforts.

Most recently, the European Space Agency (ESA) announced the successful deployment of the first metal 3D printer in space. Designed by Airbus Defence and Space SAS, the metal 3D printer produced its first test parts aboard the ISS just last year.

Challenges of 3D printing in space

Despite the overall positive results from investigations of space-based AM thus far, significant challenges remain. Few people understand this better than Gilles Bailet, an engineer and lecturer in space technology at the University of Glasgow. Bailet recently completed a series of tests on a 3D printer he designed specifically for in-space applications, riding the “vomit comet” to simulate a microgravity environment.

“You can’t just take an off-the-shelf 3D printer and add some ruggedized motors, a bit more glue in your screws and send that into space,” he explained. “You need to reinvent the way you do 3D printing.”

For Bailet, that reinvention includes swapping spools of filament for a granular material and a new type of extruder that can print in the vacuum of space as well as inside the ISS. There’s a tendency to think of 3D printing in space as happening exclusively in pressurized environments but, while that is challenging on its own, 3D printing in vacuum is considerably more difficult.

“There’s no air for convection to make the cooling rate of parts slow enough that they won’t delaminate or break,” Bailet explained. “This is a major constraint.” He also noted the significant temperature variations happening outside the ISS, where the thermometer can fluctuate between -150 C to over 100 C. Not an ideal environment for any manufacturing process, let alone one that depends so heavily on getting the temperature right.

In addition, as indicated above, there are challenges that come with 3D printing in microgravity, even inside a pressurized, temperature-controlled environment. Bailet noted that the pellets his printer uses as feedstock tend to clump together in microgravity, which can clog the extruder. For this reason, part of his testing on the vomit comet included varying print speeds. However, this led to an auspicious discovery that could actually increase the efficiency of his machine.

“We needed to find the optimum print speed, where you print as fast as you need using a minimal amount of energy. What we found was that you don’t need to run your feeding system continuously and instead you can run it so that you’re adding packets of pellets to the extruder, which is more energy efficient.”

Benefits of 3D printing in space

The advantages of deploying additive manufacturing in space are very similar to the advantages of deploying it here on Earth.

Take the supply chain benefits, for example. On Earth, AM can reduce or even eliminate the need to rely on geographically attenuated supply chains, shortening the distance between suppliers and customers and minimizing the risks of disruption. The same goes for space-based AM, with fewer components needing to be sent via rocket launches. Atoms add mass and adding mass costs money, but bits are effectively free once the infrastructure to send, receive and use them is in place.

This points to another of 3D printing’s often-touted terrestrial advantages: maintenance and repair applications. Entire production lines can be stalled in the wait for a critical replacement part to arrive, but it’s an even bigger problem when you’re orbiting 250 miles above the Earth’s surface.

“We estimate that in 2023, the space sector lost 2.2 billion dollars to malfunctions in the deployment of antennas, solar panels, and other systems,” Bailet said. “So, even without thinking about building really big spacecraft or new antennas, we already have these big problems to solve.”

This brings us to the killer app for 3D printing: being able to produce assemblies and components that would be impossible to create using more traditional manufacturing methods. In space, that advantage is exponentially greater, since many traditional manufacturing methods, such as CNC machining, aren’t even practically possible in a microgravity environment.

Given all these advantages of 3D printing in space, the question isn’t so much why but rather, why not?

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So, if additive manufacturing (AM) is the way to go in zero-g, the natural question to ask is: What should we use it for?

A team of MIT engineers have just provided one answer: 3D printed electrospray engines.

These thrusters apply an electric field to a conductive liquid to generate a high-speed jet of droplets that can propel small spacecraft, such as satellites. However, because the thrust they generate is relatively small, electrospray engines typically operate in parallel as arrays, and manufacturing these arrays is both expensive and time-consuming, requiring semiconductor cleanroom fabrication.

“Using semiconductor manufacturing doesn’t match up with the idea of low-cost access to space. We want to democratize space hardware. In this work, we are proposing a way to make high-performance hardware with manufacturing techniques that are available to more players,” said Luis Fernando Velásquez-García in a press release. Velásquez-García is a principal research scientist in MIT’s Microsystems Technology Laboratories and senior author of a paper describing the thrusters.

The MIT electrospray engine consists of eight emitter modules, each of which contains an array of four individual emitters that operate in unison.

“Using a one-size-fits-all fabrication approach doesn’t work because these subsystems are at different scales. Our key insight was to blend additive manufacturing methods to achieve the desired outcomes, then come up with a way to interface everything so the parts work together as efficiently as possible,” said Velásquez-García.

The researchers combined two-photon polymerization (2PP) with digital light processing to produce their design, with the former fabricating the emitter modules while the latter produced the manifold block which houses them and supplies them with propellant.

After testing to ensure compatibility between the printed materials and the liquid propellant, the researchers concluded that their prototype was able to generate thrust more efficiently than larger, more expensive chemical rockets in addition to outperforming existing electrospray engine designs. Further researcher will endeavor to demonstrate a satellite that utilizes a 3D printed electrospray engine during operation and for deorbiting.

The research is published in the journal Advanced Science.

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Enter AM supplier Stratasys and Novineer, a technology company specializing in generative geometry and toolpath design. Together, these two businesses are the recipients of a Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) award from AFWERX, the innovation arm of the Department of the Air Force. The award is intended to advance non-planar toolpath optimization in AM by integrating manufacturing specifications directly into non-planar toolpaths.

“Our collaboration with Stratasys and the U.S. Air Force marks a significant leap in non-planar additive manufacturing,” said Ali Tamijani, CEO of Novineer in a press release. “By developing advanced toolpath optimization solutions, we are enabling the production of high-performance aerospace components with enhanced mechanical properties and greater manufacturing efficiency.”

Novineer has stated that it will apply its generative toolpath design technology to automate non-planar toolpath optimization for 3D printing to ensure alignment with load-bearing requirements and thereby maximize strength, stiffness and acoustic performance of additively manufactured aerospace components.

“We are excited to partner with Novineer to push the boundaries of additive manufacturing,” said James Page, vice president of software at Stratasys in the same release. “This project will help establish non-planar 3D printing as a viable, scalable solution for aerospace applications, unlocking new possibilities for mission-critical manufacturing.”

If the project proves successful, the Air Force could see smoother surface finishes, stronger parts and potentially faster printing speeds for additively manufactured aerospace components.

This is yet another example of how 3D printing is reshaping the defense landscape.

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Wouldn’t it be great if there was a way to solve both problems at once?

That’s the thinking behind the UK’s Tornado 2 Tempest project, an initiative launched by the Ministry of Defence (MOD) that will see components from retired Tornado fighter jets ground down and 3D printed into new components for Tempest fighter jets. The MOD is joined in this project by Rolls-Royce and Additive Manufacturing Solutions (AMS), a UK-based additive manufacturing (AM) service provider.

AMS has already reported success in using this method to produce 3D printed nose cones and fan blades for the Rolls-Royce Orpheus engine, both of which passed suitability and safety checks on a test engine.

“This project turned our proposed solutions into a reality, and we have been very humbled and grateful to the MOD and Rolls Royce, for allowing us to showcase our capability to deliver game-changing circular economy processes and parts in Defence,” said Rob Higham, director and CEO of AMS in a press release from the company.

One might wonder whether 3D printing is strictly necessary for such a project, given that the old components could conceivably be melted down, reforged and machined using more traditional manufacturing techniques. However, as pointed out by Thomas Powell in a release from Rolls-Royce:

“Not only can this solution reduce the costs and burden of sourcing critical and high-value metals, but it can also produce components that are lighter, strong and longer lasting than those made through traditional forging techniques, thereby further enhancing the MOD’s overall sustainability and effectiveness.”

Powell is strategic and submarine recycling senior commercial manager for the Rolls-Royce Defence Recycling and Disposal Team. His point was further emphasized by a statement from Maria Eagle, the UK’s Minister for Defence Procurement and Industry:

“By working with key industry partners, we can deliver savings, reduce reliance on global supply chains and ensure our Armed Forces have the very best kit to keep our country safe.”

Sustainability and defense objectives rarely seem to align (What’s more unsustainable than war?) but in this case, through AM, the UK’s engineers are targeting material waste, carbon emissions and weaknesses in the supply chain with a single, surgical strike.

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The U.S. Army is getting in on the additive action as well with the newly opened 3D printed barracks in Fort Bliss, TX. In fact, these are the first 3D printed structures to comply with the Defense Department’s updated Unified Facilities Criteria, which provides construction guidance for DOD projects. ICON, the Texas-based additive construction firm that spearheaded the project, has stated that each of the three new buildings encompasses 5,700 square feet, which made them the largest planned 3D printed structures in the Western Hemisphere when construction began last year.

The project was completed with assistance from the Fort Bliss Garrison Directorate of Public Works and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. According to a statement from the Army, these facilities will initially house troops deploying to Fort Bliss in support of the installation’s Mobilization Force Generation Installation mission. The Army has also stated that each building can accommodate 56 soldiers.

The barracks were built with ICON’s Vulcan, a five-ton, gantry-style 3D printer that’s nearly 16 feet tall and 47 feet wide. The machine uses a proprietary concrete-based material called Lavacrete, which ICON claims can be tailored to local environmental conditions, such as humidity and temperature, to ensure optimal performance.

“The great senator Robert Francis Kennedy once said, ‘Do not look at things and wonder why, dream new ideas and say ‘why not?’” quoted Lt. Gen. David Wilson, deputy Army chief of staff, G-9 (Installations) at the official ribbon cutting. “We’re here today because many people dreamed of new ideas and said ‘why not,’ and that’s why we’re delivering this state-of-the-art facility to the Army today.

“Fort Bliss is not only a military installation; it’s a cornerstone of our nation’s defense and a symbol of resilience, strength, and enduring commitment to our nation—a place of growth and transformation,” Wilson added. “This post has evolved with the times, embracing new technologies, new strategies, and new ways of serving our country,” he said. “So, it’s fitting that we gather here today to open new barracks that embody the same spirit of evolution and progress.”

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Until now, such tuning has largely been a matter of trial-and-error, but a joint study by engineers from Harvard University, Princeton University, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory and Brookhaven National Laboratory has produced a playbook that can help engineers program the alignment and actuation of 3D printed LCEs. Using X-ray characterization during the printing process enabled the researchers to quantify LCE alignment at the microscale, forming the basis for a framework to guide their design and fabrication in the future.

“When this project began, we simply didn’t have a good understanding of how to precisely control liquid crystal alignment during extrusion-based 3D printing,” explained Rodrigo Telles in a Harvard press release. “Yet it is their degree of alignment that gives rise to varying amounts of actuation and contraction when heated.” Telles is a graduate student in the John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences and first author on the published research.

Telles and his colleagues used different nozzle shapes – tapered and hyperbolic – to study how the ink’s flow contributed to the LCE’s molecular alignment. By varying extrusion speed and nozzle shape, they were able to create two types of filaments: one with an outer layer of well-aligned molecules surrounding a poorly aligned core, and another with uniform alignment throughout.

“In the 3D printing community, most of us use a relatively small number of commercially available printheads. This study showed us that it’s important to pay attention to the details of both nozzle geometry and flow – and that we can exploit them to control material properties,” said assistant professor Emily Davidson in the same release. Davidson is a former Harvard graduate student now working at Princeton.

The team worked with researchers at a wide-angle X-ray scattering beamline Brookhaven National Laboratory to take detailed X-ray measurements during 3D printing. This method allowed them to look inside the nozzles to visualize LCE alignment using different nozzle geometries and flow conditions. The X-ray measurements helped them determine the precise degree of alignment of the liquid crystalline molecules at any given position within the nozzles, providing a road map for their flow-induced alignment that is linked to tunable nozzle designs and printing parameters. Among their results was that a nozzle with a hyperbolic shape created better and more uniform alignment than conventional nozzles.

“The ability to ‘see’ into liquid crystal elastomers and quantify their alignment at the microscale during printing via wide angle X-ray scattering measurements has provided a fundamental framework of their processing-structure-property relationships for the first time,” said professor Jennifer Lewis of Harvard, the study’s senior author.

The research is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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Of course, assessing whether a product or process ain’t broke is no simple matter. The pace of cultural, environmental and technological change in the 21^st century is such that products and processes can become broke simply by remaining static.

Take construction, for example. It’s a sector well-known for hewing to the old “If it ain’t broke…” adage and yet, as demand for additional housing and revitalized infrastructure continues to increase, the pressure to find new, more efficient methods is increasing as well.

What will it take to shake construction out of the doldrums?

How did it get there in the first place?

I sat down with Ryan Lusk, CEO of Chattanooga-based Branch Technology, to talk about where the construction sector is heading and how 3D printing fits into that future.

Engineering.com: Why do you think we haven’t seen as much technological disruption in construction compared to other sectors? Is it a matter of having to overcome regulatory hurdles, or does it just come down to inertia?

Lusk: That’s certainly the million-dollar question. From a data standpoint, there’s a McKinsey study from a few years ago that ranked industries by their adoption of new technologies and innovation. Construction was second to last – only above fish hatcheries.

Why is that? Broadly, there is an inertia component, but construction is also really a collection of sub-industries, each with competing interests and incentives. You have the design side, with architects who use cutting-edge software, from early CAD and CAM to today’s AI-driven generative design tools. That technology has dramatically outpaced manufacturing capabilities and cost-effectiveness, which has been a limiting factor.

Then there’s development, which includes cost structures and financing, and finally, the actual construction – the general contractors and installation teams. These groups often have competing incentives. Architects typically aren’t too aggressive about adopting new technology. We jokingly say they want silver medals – they don’t want to be the guinea pigs.

Developers tend to be more open to technology, and in the built-world side, general contractors are already struggling with a lack of skilled labor. They’re focused on what they already know how to do, so adopting anything new is a challenge.

If you ranked these stakeholders by their priorities – design, cost, installation – you’d get very different rankings, which creates a difficult environment for disruption. Everyone is profitable enough that they don’t feel the need to innovate or adopt new technology.

But 50 or 100 years into the future, people might find it crazy that we used to drop all these materials out in the woods or an open field, and then an army of workers would assemble a structure on-site. We wouldn’t do that for any other product we buy.

How does what you’re doing at Branch Technologies apply here?

We 3D print a lattice structure called the Branch Matrix, which is similar to cell walls in our bodies and provides the overall form, function, and design. We then infill it with construction-grade foam and robotically mill it down to its final geometry.

The result is an incredibly lightweight yet strong composite product, fine-tuned for various construction applications.

This process falls under the umbrella of additive manufacturing. However, while most additive manufacturing approaches focus on how much material needs to be layered up – such as FDM printing or concrete printing for residential housing – we ask, “How little material can we use while still achieving the required performance and structural characteristics?”

In fiscal year 2024, we experienced 300% growth, primarily driven by our facade product for exterior building cladding. We also have several other applications in development.

Facades are primarily used in new construction. However, we have also developed a patented energy-efficient retrofit product called Branch Regenerate, which is currently being installed at Kirtland Air Force Base in Albuquerque, NM.

This product follows a similar material stack but involves additional steps. We start with a high-definition LiDAR scan of the existing building, typically a 50- or 60-year-old structure with bowed or cracked walls and architectural features. Using this scan, we create a 3D model that drives our production processes. We then mill the backside of our facade panels to accommodate architectural features before installing them to enhance the building’s energy efficiency.

Do you see the retrofit approach you’re taking in Albuquerque and elsewhere as a way to overcome some of the hurdles to innovation we’ve been discussing?

Yes, exactly. In this case, we actually have something of a regulatory tailwind. Energy efficiency mandates are looming for 2025 and 2030, and sustainability is top of mind for many. Beyond that, there’s a real cost driver—some studies estimate that 40% of energy usage is lost through a building’s facade and envelope. That makes energy efficiency upgrades a priority from both a regulatory and a cost perspective.

Right now, there aren’t many good or cost-effective options. Tearing down and rebuilding a structure isn’t realistic—it’s disruptive, costly, and requires permitting and approvals all over again. Removing and replacing an existing facade is also highly disruptive, often requiring tenants to vacate the building. So, developing a rapid, cost-effective recladding system makes a lot of sense. By producing components asynchronously while other trades are working on their parts, we save tremendous time and labor on the job site.

On the topic of labor, it’s well known that construction is facing a labor shortage. Does your technology address that challenge, or is it more orthogonal to it?

It depends on the project, but labor is a big factor. To drive adoption in the construction industry, you need the “Holy Grail” of cost parity or even savings. We often compete with precast GFRC [Glass Fiber Reinforced Concrete] panels and other heavy, bulky products.

So, we conducted a case study on a 50-story tower that we hope to work on. Originally, the facade was designed for precast GFRC or architectural precast. Using our facade panels instead would save over 34 million pounds in weight compared to those alternatives. That reduction allows the slab edge on all 50 floors to be reduced from 15 inches to about 6 inches.

From a labor standpoint, traditional precast requires dedicated crane time and skilled workers to hoist and weld heavy panels. In contrast, our panels can be installed using a simple swing lift or cherry picker.

Where do you see construction heading over the next 10 years? And how do you see 3D printing, or Branch specifically, playing into that?

I think the adoption curve of new technology is accelerating. I just attended the CREtech conference in New York. It was really exciting and encouraging to see the momentum for all things proptech and contech: smart homes, smart buildings, data management and energy management technologies.

In construction, there’s a distinction between residential and commercial applications. Different technologies will gain traction in each. In residential, companies like Icon are doing intriguing work with 3D printing. In commercial, the approach will have a bigger impact as we refine our products to influence more of the total building budget and project scope.

One application we’re excited about is temporary homeless shelters. Our technology allows us to create lightweight, rapidly assembled shelters that can be set up in an hour or two. They are secure, have lockable doors, self-leveling feet and HVAC, providing a dignified housing solution. The leasing model makes these shelters a cost-effective solution for cities, municipalities and charitable organizations. After use, they can be sanitized and relocated to areas in need, whether for homeless encampments, natural disaster relief, or refugee housing.

Another particularly fun and meaningful project we did was for NASA’s new Space Camp Operations Center, where they bring in the next generation of STEM students who will hopefully become tomorrow’s astronauts and engineers. After we did some ideating with them on what the building should look like, including the façade and a large entryway, we were able to obtain a LIDAR scan of the actual surface of the Moon. Using that data, we recreated the surface of the Moon on both sides of the building.

It’s a really beautiful recreation of the actual lunar surface, but it also serves as a symbol. In the early days, we were focused on extraterrestrial applications while we were developing this technology. Now, we’re bringing it back to Earth to solve problems here.

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Let’s get to it!

Additive manufacturing research review

In this section, we review recent additive manufacturing research papers published in open-access formats, summarizing each article with comments from the researcher(s) when possible. We also include links to the full texts for further reading.

Improving rapid sand casting with additive manufacturing

A team of engineers from the University of Johannesburg, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, Tshwane University of Technology and the Air Force Institute of Technology, Nigeria took an in-depth look at the effects of various sand properties on the quality of rapid sand molds and cores created with additive manufacturing.

Two of the most significant properties they identified were grain shape and packing density, both of which impact conductivity and heat capacity during the casting process. The researchers suggest that closer attention to sand properties as well as hybrid sands incorporating engineered additives could improve the thermal and mechanical properties of cast parts.

Read the full text.

Spatial variation of green density in binder jet additive manufacturing

Binder jetting processes (BJT) and L-PBF processes are both known for having issues with geometric distortions due to shrinkage. However, while L-PBF can correct for this in-situ by spreading more powder than a part’s layer thickness, BJT keeps the powder layer constant, resulting in greater distortions. Two engineers – Albert To at the University of Pittsburgh and Basil Paudel at National Taiwan University – tackled this problem by studying the effects of geometric size on the variations of green density in BJT test parts.

“[E]ngineers should measure the green density variation in the parts once the build design is fixed and use that for distortion compensation. If the build design is changed, say the location of parts or number of parts in the build is changed, the green density variation should be measured again.”

– Albert C. To, Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science, Swanson School of Engineering, University of Pittsburgh

They found that spatial variations in BJT processes have a significant impact on green density, such that systems with larger build volumes were subject to notably higher discrepancies – more than 10%. Fortunately, by accounting for spatial green density variations in their finite element sintering models, the researchers were able to reduce the errors in predicting BJT part geometry to within 1% (approximately 0.5mm).

Read the full text.

Balancing strength and ductility in Ti-6Al-4V alloys

Engineers from Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH) and Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) have developed a new machine learning approach that optimizes Ti-6Al-4V alloys by adjusting the parameters of the laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) process. Using a Pareto active learning framework, the researchers explored 296 candidate combinations – including both processing and post-processing parameters – based on an initial training dataset of 119 parameter combinations.

As a result, the team identified a set of ten Ti-6Al-4V alloys, with the best balance of strength and ductility exhibiting an ultimate tensile strength of 1,190 MPa and total elongation of 16.5%.

Read the full text.

WAAM simulation

Wire arc additive manufacturing (WAAM) is often compared to conventional welding and, indeed, the two processes are quite similar. Nevertheless, there are crucial differences between conventional welding and WAAM and, as such, the latter is in need of process-specific data to ensure its optimal application. A team of researchers from Clausthal University of Technology in Germany did just that by applying thermal finite element simulations to compute the temperature evolution of WAAM components.

“Numerical simulations offer invaluable insights into the additive manufacturing process allowing for systematic analysis of various process parameters. When carefully calibrated with real experimental data, these simulations provide a reliable process model. This contrasts with traditional trial-and-error concepts or design of experiments, which often require numerous time-consuming and resource-intensive experiments, quickly becoming prohibitive when more parameters are involved. To optimize additive manufacturing processes effectively, numerical simulations and experimental validation should work in tandem.”

– Jendrik-Alexander Tröger, Institute of Applied Mechanics, Clausthal University of Technology

On the basis of experimental data, the researchers report that their simulations helped tune WAAM parameters to optimize component cooling, in addition to reducing processing time compared to manually selected parameters by nearly half.

Read the full text.

Optimizing 3D printing for engineering plastics

One of the key advancements needed for polymer 3D printing to see more production applications is the ability to work with high-temperature plastics, such as polyether ether ketone (PEEK). That’s why a team of engineers from Hubei University of Technology and Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, China has been studying how to optimize machine parameters for engineering plastics.

In their study, the researchers examined the effects of printing speed, layer thickness, and nozzle temperature – among others – on molding accuracy for PEEK samples. They found that layer thickness had the biggest influence on dimensional accuracy, followed by filling rate, nozzle temperature and printing speed. They report that the optimal combination of parameters for fused deposition modeling of PEEK is a printing speed of 15 mm/s, a layer thickness of 0.1 mm, a nozzle temperature of 420˚ C and a filling rate of 50%.

Read the full text.

Additive manufacturing market matters

In this section, we discuss notable changes in the share prices of publicly traded additive manufacturing companies, with additional comments on major contracts and other announcements from both public and private companies. Note that these are subject to the latest available data as of January 31, 2025 at 9am EST.

Notable shifts in AM share price

Amongst the six publicly traded AM suppliers listed above, two in particular stand out in both month-over-month and year-over-year performance.

The first is 3D Systems, which saw the second largest positive shift month-over-month and the second smallest negative shift year-over-year. The company has made several important announcements since December, including the sale of its Geomagic software portfolio to Hexagon as well as a new collaboration with Daimler Truck | Daimler Buses on 3D printing spare parts.

The second publicly traded AM supplier worth noting is Materialise, which, in addition to having the largest positive shift month-over-month, is the only AM supplier to see a positive shift in share price year-over-year. As a 3D printing software provider, the company partnered with numerous organizations in 2024, including nTop Ansys and EOS, as well as Renishaw, Stratasys and ArcelorMittal. This co-opetitive approach was exemplified by the formation of the Leading Minds Consortium at last year’s Formnext.

Meanwhile, the two largest publicly traded AM service providers, Protolabs and Xometry, are a mixed bag. The former is up slightly month-over-month and more substantially year-over-year, while the latter is down significantly from December but still up compared to January 2024.

Overall, publicly traded AM companies are showing positive median performance month-over-month and, while they’re still in the negatives year-over-year, they’re down significantly less compared with their YoY performance of the past two years. This suggests that the burgeoning optimism for the AM industry’s future is well warranted.

AM business developments

A few other noteworthy events took place in the AM business world over the past month.

Let’s start with the good news.

EOS celebrated a significant milestone in January with the sale of its 5,000^th industrial 3D printer: an EOS M 400-4. The machine was acquired by North Carolina-based Keselowski Advanced Manufacturing (KAM), which is part of contract manufacturer, ADDMAN Group. In an EOS press release about the sale, North American president Glynn Fletcher referred to the company’s founder, Hans Langer, saying:

“To this day, we remain true to Hans’ original vision. This focus ensures we dedicate all our energy to building the best quality products and services for organizations like ADDMAN, rather than bowing to deceptive market dynamics and misguided competitive pressures. For us, this has resulted in consistent business growth, and I’m confident we’ll reach 10,000 installations much faster than the first 100.”

Fletcher’s statement brings to mind the latest update from Nano Dimension, which dominated much of the AM industry news cycle last year with the announcement that it would acquire Desktop Metal after quashing Stratasys’ attempt to do the same in 2023. Not long after that came a second acquisition announcement from Nano Dimension, this time targeting Markforged. The company capped off last year’s drama with the ousting of CEO Yoav Stern but the situation has hardly stabilized since then.

This week, interim CEO Julien Lederman issued a statement to Nano Dimension’s shareholders, acknowledging the company’s “substantial negative enterprise value” and promising to prioritize shareholder interests, demonstrable return on investment (ROI) and “prudent operating expense management” (in that order). What that looks like so far is a decision to end Nano Dimension’s shareholder rights plan and a $150M stock buyback.

In light of this, claims from Nano Dimension’s previous leadership that the investment firms Murchison Ltd. and Anson Advisors Inc. were “try[ing]  to distract our leadership team, liquidate Nano, and line their own pockets with our cash reserves,” may seem vindicated, hyperbole notwithstanding.

I can’t help but wonder whether Nano Dimension is starting down the path that many believe led to Boeing’s woes: prioritizing short-term financial gains for shareholders over long-term investments in engineering. If that is the case, we should expect Lederman (or his permanent replacement) to open the second envelope before the end of Q1.

3DPTV

You’ve made it this far, so here’s a little treat for the end of our first column.

Cody Clements is an Australian metal fabricator and automotive electrician who also hosts a YouTube channel called Stick Shift Garage. In one of his most recent videos, Clements tried forming sheet aluminum using 3D printed dies made from PLA+ and designed on Fusion 360.

The results are surprisingly good and his viewers’ responses were so enthusiastic that he just released a follow-up video where he puts some of their suggestions into practice. Both are worth watching if you’re interested in 3D printing for tooling applications.

That wraps up the first edition of our Additive Manufacturing Progress Update!

Send your questions, comments or complaints to me at iwright@wtwhmedia.com, and they might just appear in next month’s column.

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