Currently, there is still a lack of awareness regarding the potential of micro additive manufacturing. In order to show the capabilities of this technology, Nanofabrica has recently carried out a test in the development of direct rapid soft tooling (DRST).
In the long run, the Israel-based company aims to enable manufacturers to leverage micro fabrication as a mass production tool.
As part of this experimentation, the company printed a mould that lasted 20 shots It now plans to increase this to 1000 shots in the coming months.
Technically speaking, Nanofabrica injected PP, PE, and ABS into a 3D printed mould, which was manufactured with a new material that the company is currently developing. In the initial experiments, the moulds lasted for 20 shots with a moulding pressure of 400 bars at 230°C. It took Nanofabrica an hour to additively manufacture one mould at the cost of under $20. The materials were injected using an Arburg 35-ton machine.
The trials were initiated at the request of key industry players who were interested in assessing the time and cost savings that are inherent when producing DRST as opposed to conventional hard steel tools for injection moulding. In addition, the companies were eager to achieve the high surface finish as well as tiny features and complexity possible through the use of Nanofabrica’s AM technology which are effectively impossible using conventional machining of mould tools.
Jon Donner, CEO at Nanofabrica says, “The time and cost associated with the fabrication of conventional tooling for injection moulding means that many OEMs are assessing the viability of creating AM produced DRST for short run production parts and functional prototypes. As a company, Nanofabrica is consistently experimenting week-to-week in the area of AM mould tool fabrication as it recognises the huge potential benefits for manufacturers, and is consistently achieving ground-breaking improvements in mechanical capabilities, mould designs, materials, and the accuracy and integrity of parts injected using the AM mould tool.”
The possibility of small and even medium batch manufacturing
Using Nanofabrica’s Terra 250 precision AM platform to produce DRST capable of manufacturing upwards of 1000 parts per tool opens up the possibility of small and even medium batch manufacturing. This is a product of Nanofabrica’s platform that is able to accommodate the manufacture of multiple small tools in each build, and so manufacturers will be able to produce numerous replacement tools at extremely low cost.
Tovit Neizer, VP Business Development at Nanofabrica adds, “The rest is just math! In the future, for the cost of one aluminium precise mould which costs about $10K you could manufacture 500 soft moulds on a Terra 250, leading to about 500K final parts through a significantly faster process. In addition, each tool can be adapted as required, opening up the possibility of speed to first part out, and the ability to correct during the manufacturing process according to market and customer needs.”
It is usually the case that when AM produced DRST and traditional injection moulding are compared, the savings in terms of product development time and cost are seen as the most compelling benefits for using AM. However, the fact that AM is relatively agnostic to complexity means that AM produced DRST could also stimulate innovation in product design and manufacture. AM can achieve geometries impossible using conventional processes, and as such is positioned as a key enabling technology driving the production of cutting-edge products as well as shortening the product development cycle. This is because it is quite often the case that product design updates are shelved by manufacturers due to the cost of new traditional moulds.
Picture courtesy of Idan Gil – Remember, you can
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