Our prospects are proving day-after-day that elements produced with additive manufacturing can meet stringent manufacturing requirements throughout aerospace, medical, robotics and shopper items sectors.
The measurable outcomes they see together with sooner cycles, decrease prices, decreased threat and verified high quality are the true drivers, not the expertise itself. And these should not speculative advantages however are documented outcomes drawn from 1000’s of producing runs, design iterations and field-tested elements.
Right here we are going to share some anonymised case research exploring how our digital manufacturing platform interprets design freedom into production-grade outcomes.
Aerospace: From prototype to flight in weeks
One aerospace producer growing electrical plane wanted to design light-weight buildings that might face up to aerodynamic hundreds whereas remaining serviceable in harsh out of doors situations. Conventional tooling would have meant six-figure funding and months of delay.
By shifting to additive manufacturing manufacturing for structural and non-critical elements, the engineering group decreased design-to-flight time by greater than 40%. Every plane now integrates between 60 and 80 additively manufactured elements, together with housings, brackets, interface panels and sensor mounts all produced utilizing laser-sintered nylon and MJF PA12.
Over lots of of flight hours, none of those printed elements have proven degradation inside design hundreds. The corporate’s lead engineer put it plainly: 3D printing has grow to be “as routine as machining, however sooner, lighter and simpler to validate.”
For aerospace initiatives the place certification and reliability rule each choice, that shift marks a real transformation: iterative engineering with out compromise.
Healthcare: Scaling innovation, defending belongings
order from a hospital.
In hospital environments, reliability is life-critical. A medical-equipment provider confronted recurring failures in cable administration programs that prompted downtime, questions of safety and price leakage. They labored with Shapeways to design a easy however strong 3D printed retention gadget — sufficiently small to miss, however highly effective sufficient to stop six-figure losses yearly.
Inside months, the provider had deployed over a thousand items, every digitally manufactured on demand from validated, biocompatible supplies. The consequence: a projected $1 million in gear belongings protected and near-zero alternative delays.
Elsewhere within the medical subject, a design group creating robotic-surgery coaching programs used additive manufacturing to reinvent the best way surgeons study delicate procedures. Their problem was to simulate complicated, dexterous motions with out counting on costly cadaver or artificial fashions.
Utilizing selective laser sintering (SLS), the group created lots of of modular elements, colour-coded and nested for environment friendly builds, and examined by means of fast iteration. The result was a totally modular coaching platform that may very well be reconfigured for a number of ability ranges and shipped globally with out tooling. The designers estimate that Shapeways’ rapid-prototyping functionality reduce their growth time by greater than half — and opened new prospects for data-driven medical training.
{Hardware} & Robotics: Manufacturing on the pace of innovation
In high-tech {hardware} growth, time is the enemy of innovation. A robotics startup specialising in micro-manufacturing programs wanted to overtake a precision pick-and-place mechanism that wasn’t performing reliably. Early makes an attempt at in-house additive manufacturing manufacturing lacked precision and mechanical energy; injection moulding was cost-prohibitive.
Shapeways produced the redesigned element in PA12, delivering superior rigidity and constant tolerances. The half dealt with twice the payload of the unique model, and the group moved from prototype to manufacturing in days as an alternative of weeks.
That single enchancment cascaded by means of the corporate’s growth cycle, enabling sooner iteration and higher-quality finish merchandise. The identical companion moved on to supply practically all manufacturing elements by means of Shapeways’ certified manufacturing community, citing repeatability, dimensional accuracy and pace of supply as decisive components.
Client & Design: Scaling bespoke manufacturing
Designers and shopper manufacturers are equally demanding in aesthetics, precision and consistency. One luxury-goods studio makes use of Shapeways’ steel and polymer printing to create algorithmically generated jewelry items which are every distinctive however manufactured with sub-millimetre repeatability.
One other designer working an internet storefront scales international gross sales by means of Shapeways’ automated fulfilment: each order is printed, completed and shipped beneath their model, with no bodily stock or tooling price. In each instances, the power to maneuver seamlessly from one-off creation to steady manufacturing is redefining the economics of bespoke manufacturing.
Their widespread denominator will not be creative expression however manufacturing reliability utilising the identical high quality programs, inspection processes and traceability that energy Shapeways’ industrial prospects.
Throughout Industries: The metrics of recent manufacturing
Whereas all of those instances differ, the outcomes share a standard sample:
- 20–50% sooner growth cycles by means of fast iteration and digital validation
- Zero tooling funding and near-zero bodily stock, because of on-demand manufacturing
- Repeatable high quality and dimensional accuracy throughout batches and supplies
- Scalable workflows that stretch from prototype to serial manufacturing with out course of change
These are the metrics that outline next-generation {hardware} manufacturing: not hypothetical future states, however measurable, repeatable efficiency achieved day-after-day by Shapeways’ prospects.
Turning proof into partnership
The shift from 3D printing as a novelty to additive manufacturing manufacturing as infrastructure has been ongoing for a few years. Producers ought to now not ask whether or not it’s doable to print end-use elements; they need to search the quickest path to integrating them into manufacturing.
Behind each prototype or half is a partnership constructed on high quality assurance, supplies experience and manufacturing self-discipline. That’s what allows corporations from startups to international OEMs to innovate sooner with out sacrificing reliability.
