3 Xtreme 3D Printing Stories This Week
Fast cars, giant plane engines and satellites built in space.
Aston Martins innovates for new DB11
The new Aston Martin DB11 gets an upgraded engine thanks to industrial grade 3D printing and other complimentary technologies. High performance engines need high performance technology, especially the flagship DB11 with it’s 48-valve V12 twin-turbocharged engine reaching a breakneck speed of 100km/h in 3.9 seconds. Contracting engineering firm Grainger & Worrall Aston Martin is setting out to build it’s fastest and most fuel efficient car to date.
The $160,000 car will sport an engine cast at GW’s Wolverhampton foundry using sand-mould cores made by 3D printing a mixture of specialist sand and thermosetting resin. Recycled aluminium will be used for the casting process with all the parts ending up in Cologne, Germany for assembly. 3D printing was applied when creating the mould cores due to the highly complex CAD files produced by the Aston Martin design team. The mould core is integral to achieving the shape inside the cavity. The ability to use 3D printing in the process meant that Aston Martin maintained it robust build quality whilst keeping the car lightweight. GW then finalised the build of the design using advanced CT scanning to ensure both dimensional accuracy and build integrity.
GE’s latest project takes flight
Aviation is a field continually seeing improvements thanks to 3D printing, for example Airbus’ new A380 XMB plane saving a fortune in fuel thanks to the complex geometrical shapes it has integrated made possible by 3D printing. Now it’s GE’s turn to innovate by partially 3D printing a functional plane engine.
The plane to use such an engine, the Cessna Denali. The turboprop plane hopes to use 20% less fuel than previous model with 10% more power. This is thanks to the streamlined engine design created with various 3D printed parts. 35% of all parts in the engine are to be 3D printed making history as the only production engine with this amount of 3D printed components.
The a-CT7 engine, features 12 3D printed parts replacing more than 855 conventionally manufactured parts. 3D printing’s unique ability to create large and complex assemblies in one piece meant that the smaller parts didn’t need to be manufactured, saving both time and money. Gordon Follin, ATP Engineering GM at GE Aviation explains:
“Typically, the weakest element of an assembly is where parts come together…It’s a place where you can have air leakage, or you can have wear between parts if there’s any sort of relative motion. And by using additive, you eliminate the leakage paths. You eliminate potential wear paths as well.”
Currently being tested, the a-CT7 will be continually iterated and worked on to make sure it can function correctly for it’s first full test. It shows a great example of where 3D printing has been applied to reduce the part count and weight of integral piece of a build.
3D printed Satellite to test materials in space
Satellites are usually a multi-million dollar business reserved for those that break through the large barriers to getting something into orbit. A team of researchers from Northwest Nazarene University in Idaho have broke the mould by getting the chance to launch their 3D printed satellite into space thanks to their hard work and a partnership with NASA.
The CubeSat Satellite known as the Makersat is a mere 10 x 10 x 11.35 cm. It’s a snap fit and slide design so that it can easily be assembled in a multitude of places. The objective of getting the Makersat into space is to test how the mass, density, volume, & structural degradation of 3D printed polymers are effected by being in space. Once fired into orbit, the MakerSat will travel at a whopping 17,000 miles per hour for up to 10 years. The findings will provide NASA with insights into the viability of 3D printing on the ISS and further down the line, 3D printing structures in space. Testing materials such as ABS, ULTEM and Nylon and the speed in which they decay. The reduced cost and rapid iteration speeds allowed by 3D printing means that the 3D printer on the ISS can continue the project closer to the source of the research.
