Aluminum SLS

[MikeDutsa]

Does anyone know a place that does aluminum, or other metal SLS? I've looked around and most of what I can find is plastic, or rapid proto investment casting.

thanks

[MikeDutsa]

Does anyone know a place that does aluminum, or other metal SLS? I've looked around and most of what I can find is plastic, or rapid proto investment casting.

thanks

[Matthew Giles]

http://www.stratasys.com/systems.aspx?id=484

The machines on this page do what you are looking for, try going to the contacts page and calling stratasys and ask them if they can help you or refer you to a customer who can.

Also, Design Prototyping Technologies (http://www.dpt-fast.com/) does rapid prototype investment casting, but I don't think they have machines to directly do metal parts with Electron Beam Melting.

I think a lot of F1 team gets prototype parts made by the EBM machines, because they can make full strength titanium parts.

[Dan B]

Not exactly what you are looking for...but have a look at this

http://www.zcorp.com/products/zcast.asp

http://www.zcorp.com/images/splash/zcast.jpg
They make rapid prototype molds.

[TG]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">Originally posted by Matthew Giles:
EBM machines, because they can make full strength titanium parts. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

It's not quite full strength. There are plenty of voids and imperfections in the finished product... it's trying to make powder a homogenous piece (think back to chemistry or materials and the volumetric packing efficiency of molecules, now just on a slightly larger scale with granules of metallic powder). However, it is by far the strongest type of rapid prototyping available out there as opposed to the plastics used in other methods. There is an SAE paper of an fsae team using SLS titanium uprights on their car a few years ago.

[BenB]

Be careful when designing using "metal" SLS parts. The way these parts are made are they are metal dust mixed with plastics (typically nylon) The SLS machine sinters the nylon together making a mixture of a nylon and metal part. The part is then post-cured in an oven normally that essentially heats the part just under the melting temperature. This step increases the strength, but it is still a mixture of plastic and metal dust basically. The part will normally still have plastic-like mechanical properties.

3D Systems is the leader in SLS rapid prototype technology. Their version of the powder is DuraForm-AF. I think Scicon Technolodies has this powder available.

http://www.scicontech.com/
http://www.3dsystems.com/products/datafiles/lasersinter...m_AF_LS_material.pdf (http://www.3dsystems.com/products/datafiles/lasersintering/datasheets/DS_DuraForm_AF_LS_material.pdf)

[FHR07]

I know this is getting a little off topic, but metal SLS is a similar but distictly different process than we (SDSM&T) use for the front uprights on our car. I am not an expert on SLS, only aware of how it is done. Apparently there are many powders mixed together and deposited. At that point the part is only partially completed and many more steps are required to acquire a part that has properties only approximately 80% of a homogeneous part. The process used for our uprights is known not as SLS but as Laser Powder Deposition or LENS (Laser Engineered Net Shaping) or DMD (Direct Metal Deposition). In this process, a laser is used in conjunction with a powder injection system and a controlled atmosphere (argon) to create free form parts using only a small amount of substrate to begin the forming process. The material that is deposited is nearly 100% homogeneous and needs little or no post processing. We only touch the mating surfaces to ensure tight tolerances with the spherical bearing attachment locations and that sort of thing. We use Ti-6al-4v for its weight and stiffness characteristics. Aluminum is very hard to deposit because it is reflective to the laser which can be bad in all sorts of ways.

[oz_olly]

FHR07

Which team are you from? Would you be able to post some pictures of your uprights, they sound awesome.

Cheers

Olly
ACME Racing
UNSW@ADFA

[flavorPacket]

there are plenty of pics in the SAE paper they wrote

[MikeDutsa]

I was mostly asking for something non sae related. However we do use SLS parts on our car. Our intake (like many other teams ive noticed) is SLS/SLA.

Which makes me curious, how many teams use a rapid type process on their car?

And what do you cast them as? Do you design them to represent cast peices, blow molded, drawn, stamped, ect.. or do you cost them as rapid parts?

[BenB]

If you are doing an intake you probally don't need the aluminum SLS. Standard SLS powders are nylon and they are very strong.

SLA might be a better option. SLA has the best surface finish of any of the rapid prototype processes. In fact F1 teams make 1/2 scale models of their cars in SLA for wind tunnel testing because the surface finish is as good as their finished cars. I would think that this would also make it a good option for an intake.

If anybody is interested and could tell me how to post pictures (i am having trouble with that) I have some pictures of an SLA F1 car I took at 3D systems old office in California.

[MikeDutsa]

I needed the aluminum sls for a work related project, to simulate a diecasting, we ended up just ordering a SLA. Our intake is SLS glass filled nylon, very durable, nice surface finish, i designed it to simulate a blowmolded part. very cheep.

[flavorPacket]

We use RM technology heavily. We used SLA molds to make our (06) carbon intake manifold, as well as to rapid cast a throttle body, oilpan, wheels, manifold, the list goes on. We also SLS'd our intake and used SLA parts to test various intake designs on the flowbench. Many of our bodywork molds were also made via SLA.

I couldn't tell you how they're costed, but RM stuff definitely helps us maximize our efficiency.