Charlie, thanks for the info. Listened to the GE CC and perused the ER, but missed those 3d references.
VINDICATION is nice. Interesting, but sad, that GE manufactured 70 LEAP engines. Would have expected more given how long the LEAP has been in focus.
Going back to 2015, here and on the Yahoo Arcam board, posters continuously indicated that the LEAP was in mass production, one stating he could document 30 being produced and that EBM would not be on the LEAP, with the LEAP engine having left the station. I rebutted both points saying the LEAP was not in mass production and that we did not know if EBM would be on the LEAP with Rene saying it was still an open question.
Now we know that only 70 leaps were manufactured in 2016, to me not mass production. And to take a quote from your post; "The purchase of the manufacturer of EBM 3d means that GE has secured this element of the LEAP production process. This quote establishes that at least to GE, a better source than this poster, the LEAP train has not left the station and EBM has an impact on the leap. Bet the poster does not acknowledge the error, but he has backtracked recently saying EBM might be involved with the leap now or in the future as he predicted thousands of machines would be sold soon after saying GE would not make any bulk purchase. Yep, vindication is nice.
But i'm still disappointed as I was wrong about the speed with which 3d would take over. Thought we would be in volume production somewhere by now and yet we are not. And contrary to a poster who shouted GE has made tons of unannounced buys, GE is not even using the 10 machines it bought in 2015. Way to slow adoption for my taste which is why Arcam has and is languishing.
The quote above also suggests that ge may be utilizing EBM or thinking about utilizing it on the leap in ways that have not been announced to date. Unless Sailor is right that the speaker was confusing the nozzles which I think are lasered with ebm but would be shocked if the speaker made such a fundamental mistake. So must assume that ebm is part of the leap process as stated. Do you concur???? In any event, 3d is progressing, with the question being how fast and how much ebm will benefit.
