In sectors such as defense, laser powder bed fusion is not always the first Additive Manufacturing technology that comes to mind, especially for the creation and repair of metal parts. After Cold Spray Additive Manufacturing, another option that is explored by professionals in this field is DED metal 3D printing.
OEM Meltio recently shared an interesting example as the French Army used the company’s wire-laser metal 3D printer in an offshore manoeuvre. By providing remote assistance (from the city of Toulon), the technology helped to address immediate needs for repair and fabrication of stainless steel parts.
According to Meltio, the French army would be the third to integrate its technology as part of its tests, after the US and Spain.
Installed on board a military vessel, Meltio’s solution was assessed as part of the “Ursa Minor” exercise in May of this year. The latter is a high-intensity operational maintenance naval exercise organized by the Fleet Support Service (FSS). During that exercise, a special breakdown repair experiment was carried out in the workshops of the Navy’s logistics department in Toulon.
Upon requests from the French aircraft carrier, Charles de Gaulle, Meltio’s wire-laser metal 3D printer supported the supply and repair of fully dense parts for various industrial applications – at a low production cost per cubic centimeter, unlike traditional manufacturing methods, such as boiler making, forging and others.
As a reminder, Meltio’s process consists in the stacking of welding wires on top of each other, in the form of wire introduced into a molten bath generated by a laser. It is based on digital modeling of the replacement, which is an essential prerequisite for production.
“After months of preliminary tests at our technology center in Toulouse, south of France, to test Meltio’s wire-laser DED technology (direct material deposition with laser melting technique as welding), the transfer of the printer to Toulon was approved. The main objective of this transfer is to respond to the Navy ships that are sailing with their repair and manufacturing needs in different metallic materials, mainly stainless steels and Inconel, for which Meltio’s additive manufacturing system is very efficient in the result of the parts obtained,” Jean-Marc Quenez, Director of Innovation and Additive Manufacturing at the Service de Soutien de la Flotte (SSF) of the French Ministry of Defense, explains.
He adds, “We chose Meltio for this exercise because it allows us to repair existing metal parts and with this machine, we manufacture test parts with DED technology, not final parts that we then post-process and machine according to our needs. The Spanish brand’s metal 3D printer meets our expectations for reliability and is very easy to use by our engineers. We anticipate that this metal 3D printer will continue to be functional and will be part of our experimental additive manufacturing usage program that continues to evolve.”
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