In Process Monitoring and NDI for Additive Manufacturing: Must or Nice to have? Despite the outstanding promise of 3D Printing (3DP) and Additive Manufacturing (AM) for critical metal parts, three basic limitations exist that hold back growth and cost-effectiveness of current and future applications, namely: Quality, Geometry and Speed. In terms of quality, additive manufacturing for highly critical metal parts such as for aerospace and automotive still exhibits variability between runs, between machines, and over time. In terms of geometry, additive manufacturing can only realize a dimensional accuracy of about 100 microns with a positioning accuracy of about 20 microns, and the surface finish is very rough as compared to aerospace requirements. Also, the geometry must currently be measured by expensive post-process inspection such as X-ray CT scanning. In terms of productivity and speed, the typical output of an AM machine for metal is still below 20 cc/hr., and the entire world's production capacity of AM metal machines running 24-7-365 for an entire year would still produce less material than a steel mill could produce in half of one daily shift. Sigma Labs, Inc. is addressing the first two issues, namely quality and geometry, by implementing in-process NDI as well as process monitoring for metal Additive Manufacturing. Specific sensing and measurement technologies will be discussed as well as the 'Big Data' challenges of accumulating up to terabytes of data per part and then analyzing this data to produce actionable knowledge. Also, the reporting and interfacing requirements will be discussed to ensure that in-process, real-time on-machine inspection data can be effectively integrated into existing and legacy manufacturing execution systems and enterprise data systems used by many large aerospace and automotive suppliers.
News 
Market Data 
Discover 
