I agree--the fact that 3D printing, in all its variety, is now on the radar of so many people and organizations bodes well, as does the spread of machines, and more and more materials, across the different market segments.
Seems like the dual forces of interest from the DoD and the commercial business sector could do a lot to advance the cause of 3D printing and additive manufacturing well beyond where it is today. Couple that with all the activity on the consumer front and you've got the real makings of a market.
Thanks, Beth. The DoD's desire to make 3D printing accessible and useful for soldiers is apparently one of the main forces behind the formation of NAMII, the additive manufacturing initiative/consortium we covered: http://www.designnews.com/author.asp?section_id=1392&doc_id=251513
Nice indepth account of how 3D printing is really changing the game when it comes to creating production parts from a wide variety of materials and in a much shorter time span. Beyond the implications in the aerospace applications you mentioned, Ann, the experimentation going on to use less expensive and more portable 3D printers in army applications, in the field, as a means of helping troops with extra parts they need or more significantly medical care is really exciting.
New versions of BASF's Ecovio line are both compostable and designed for either injection molding or thermoforming. These combinations are becoming more common for the single-use bioplastics used in food service and food packaging applications, but are still not widely available.
Andrew Morris designed a circuit that could detect a stroke victim's groan and convert the sound into a signal so caregivers would know when help was needed.
New disc magnet motors fit into the design trend of stepping up to closed loop performance while maintaining the cost advantage of stepper motor technology.
At the Design News webinar on June 27, learn all about aluminum extrusion: designing the right shape so it costs the least, is simplest to manufacture, and best fits the application's structural requirements.
On April 21, NASA launched a novel project, putting into orbit three satellites that employ an off-the-shelf commercial smartphone as the control system.
From Dell / Intel® New Paradigms in Design Work Scott Hamilton, vertical market strategist for Dell Precision workstations, 5/2/2013 5
Early in my career, I worked as a draftsman and remember the days of drawing on vellum with numbered pencils and Mylar with plastic lead. This was a fun experience in the sense that I ...
I've been using workstations for more than 10 years and love finding ways to get more performance from my system. With demanding professional applications that require more power each ...
A lasting memory from my first job as an engineer in an auto assembly plant is standing on hard concrete at six in the morning, vending-machine coffee clutched in hand, listening to ...
For industrial control applications, or even a simple assembly line, that machine can go almost 24/7 without a break. But what happens when the task is a little more complex? That’s where the “smart” machine would come in. The smart machine is one that has some simple (or complex in some cases) processing capability to be able to adapt to changing conditions. Such machines are suited for a host of applications, including automotive, aerospace, defense, medical, computers and electronics, telecommunications, consumer goods, and so on. This radio show will show what’s possible with smart machines, and what tradeoffs need to be made to implement such a solution.
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