AH-1 Cobra Pilot Posted March 20, 2020 Report Share Posted March 20, 2020 This is something that will affect us in the very near future. I suspect this cylinder is rather expensive, but the cost will come down, and they can be optimized to work in any particular airplane. https://www.additivemanufacturing.media/blog/post/3d-printing-changes-a-drone-engine-the-cool-parts-show-s2e3 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carusoam Posted March 21, 2020 Report Share Posted March 21, 2020 Interesting that the aviation cylinder is manufactured for Cobra manufacturing... The brief 13minute video exposes ideas of what else can become available when using this laser printing powder process... re-imagining, re-engineering, improving on existing parts... Strong as cast parts made from molten metals... Something @Sabremech might find interesting... I think it’s Very interesting... I can see how air cooling cylinders could become more evenly controlled.... Best regards, -a- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 21, 2020 Report Share Posted March 21, 2020 (edited) Last I herd that kind of additive material manufacturing was not making parts that have the kind of strength to be a engine cylinder. I could imagine that improving. Has it already? I want a titanium engine. Edited March 22, 2020 by aviatoreb Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FloridaMan Posted March 22, 2020 Report Share Posted March 22, 2020 Also strikes me as really bad shit to be around, as in, you don’t want metal dust in your lungs. I just want a good 3D printing solution for investment casting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hank Posted March 22, 2020 Report Share Posted March 22, 2020 On 3/20/2020 at 9:31 PM, aviatoreb said: Last I herd that kind of additive material manufacturing was not making parts that have the kind of strength to be a engine cylinder. I could imagine that improving. Has it already? They've been doing this to make fuel nozzles, compressor and turbine blades for several years. That cylinders are now on the horizon is not a surprise, other than the much smaller market. 1 hour ago, FloridaMan said: Also strikes me as really bad shit to be around, as in, you don’t want metal dust in your lungs. Lots of manufacturing components are not good for you. In regular metalworking, such as making our current engine parts, there are many liquid solvents and cutting aids that you don't want to drink, to say nothing of additives put in them to allow reuse without microbial growth. Even the cooling water used for making molded plastic parts is treated to inhibit bacterial growth and reduce buildup of sludge and rust inside the molds; further north than here, it also contains antifreeze. For metal dust, that is a probkem in any surface grinding operation, such as the outer faces of your engine block and the bases of your cylinders, exhaust, etc. Gotta be flat where they meet . . . . Making these parts by additive manufacturing has different gotchas, but to me they are no worse. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 22, 2020 Report Share Posted March 22, 2020 24 minutes ago, Hank said: They've been doing this to make fuel nozzles, compressor and turbine blades for several years. That cylinders are now on the horizon is not a surprise, other than the much smaller market. Still - I was under the impression that parts built by additive manufacturing - no matter what material even metal, are less strong than say a forged metal part. Have the processes improved to mitigate this or am I wrong with what I heard? E Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yetti Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 11 hours ago, aviatoreb said: Still - I was under the impression that parts built by additive manufacturing - no matter what material even metal, are less strong than say a forged metal part. Have the processes improved to mitigate this or am I wrong with what I heard? E Sinter after printing. I have seen adds for Ti printers. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Austintatious Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 11 hours ago, aviatoreb said: Still - I was under the impression that parts built by additive manufacturing - no matter what material even metal, are less strong than say a forged metal part. Have the processes improved to mitigate this or am I wrong with what I heard? E Well, Adam savage made an Iron man suite and it was able to stop a .45 ! I think the powdered metals that are added by melting with a laser are pretty strong. Obviously if you forge and heat treat a part is can be made much harder than what would come out of a printer. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carusoam Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 Sintering is an interesting process... It uses evaporation/sublimation of the solid materials... essentially they are gluing at the surfaces of fine metal particles... the finer the particles the stronger the bond... higher temps, and longer times also help strengthen the part... Glued at the surface lacks the same strength of a cast part... that used fully melted / liquid metal.... It would be interesting to see what the max tensile strength is of parts made with the printer vs. parts made by casting... Printing test parts to put in an Instron tensile tester would be easy... PP thoughts only. Best regards, -a- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hank Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 I don't know about sintering 3D-printed parts, but parts made by traditional RIM Molding lose about 25% of their size through sintering. The entire part shrinks. It's much more than a surface treatment. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GeeBee Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 Hank is correct. GE for several years has been using additive process for compressor and turbine blades. GE sees it as the method in the coming years. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 8 hours ago, Yetti said: Sinter after printing. I have seen adds for Ti printers. I don't know which is why I asked. I was on a visit at Carnegie Mellon U about 6 years ago and part of my tour included 5 minutes at their Ti printing machine - they were printing all sorts of interesting stuff - most interesting to me was skeletal parts for human implants - eg hip replacement parts and also a very interesting scull scaffold each printed for the specific person in mind - Ti is a nice material for the because it is light and non reactive chemically. But I did ask then about the possibility of an engine cylinder and he said that its strength to that kind of impact might not be the same. But that was 6 years ago and I know this is fast evolving technology,. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 8 hours ago, Austintatious said: Well, Adam savage made an Iron man suite and it was able to stop a .45 ! I think the powdered metals that are added by melting with a laser are pretty strong. Obviously if you forge and heat treat a part is can be made much harder than what would come out of a printer. A bag of sand will stop a bullet too. Right your second sentence is just what I am asking - is this sintering process sufficiently strong for an engine cylinder or do we need casting? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FloridaMan Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 We just got an old 60 ton press at the shop to complement the big CNC machines. We were talking about how everyone seems to want to CNC or laser things these days where it only takes a few minutes to make a part. But with some of these other technologies, you can make parts in seconds. The worst misapplication of tech I think is the 3D printing of rocket engine nozzles. Those should be made using the process that you use for making O2 tanks. Instead of hours or days, those things could be produced as fast as you can say “KACHUNK” Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Austintatious Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 2 hours ago, aviatoreb said: A bag of sand will stop a bullet too. Right your second sentence is just what I am asking - is this sintering process sufficiently strong for an engine cylinder or do we need casting? A bag of sand and a 1mm thick piece of metal are not stopping a bullet in the same way. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 3 minutes ago, Austintatious said: A bag of sand and a 1mm thick piece of metal are not stopping a bullet in the same way. Sure - but I was just being literal. Since stopping a bullet alone does not on its own describing the kind of tensile strength one needs to be a combustion chamber cylinder. A bag of sand has almost no tensile strength of course - but for sure - it stops a bullet in an entirely different way. But now if stopping a bullet and being thin were sufficient we could make a combustion chamber out of a kevlar vest. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Austintatious Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 1 hour ago, aviatoreb said: Sure - but I was just being literal. Since stopping a bullet alone does not on its own describing the kind of tensile strength one needs to be a combustion chamber cylinder. A bag of sand has almost no tensile strength of course - but for sure - it stops a bullet in an entirely different way. But now if stopping a bullet and being thin were sufficient we could make a combustion chamber out of a kevlar vest. I am not a metallurgist... but I do know that kevlar is much softer than metal and it is more flexible despite its high tensile strength, so I do not believe that is a fair comparison either. Also remember, when you design something to be 3d printed, you do not have to 100% rely on the 3d printed material. Several things I have designed and printed rely on other structures as well to make up the final product as a whole. In an engine for example, if the printing medium was not suitable for the cylinder walls, you could design it so that the cylinder walls were created by a "bushing" that was of suitable composition. This gives great flexibility in the other aspects of the design. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 27 minutes ago, Austintatious said: I am not a metallurgist... but I do know that kevlar is much softer than metal and it is more flexible despite its high tensile strength, so I do not believe that is a fair comparison either. Also remember, when you design something to be 3d printed, you do not have to 100% rely on the 3d printed material. Several things I have designed and printed rely on other structures as well to make up the final product as a whole. In an engine for example, if the printing medium was not suitable for the cylinder walls, you could design it so that the cylinder walls were created by a "bushing" that was of suitable composition. This gives great flexibility in the other aspects of the design. I agree - I meant kevlar to be a not fair comparison. I was just asserting that stopping a bullet is not a suitable measure of if a material will be good to make a combustion chamber. But on the topic of 3d printing, I don't have much intelligence to offer - I was just asking questions. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yetti Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 6 hours ago, aviatoreb said: I don't know which is why I asked. I was on a visit at Carnegie Mellon U about 6 years ago and part of my tour included 5 minutes at their Ti printing machine - they were printing all sorts of interesting stuff - most interesting to me was skeletal parts for human implants - eg hip replacement parts and also a very interesting scull scaffold each printed for the specific person in mind - Ti is a nice material for the because it is light and non reactive chemically. But I did ask then about the possibility of an engine cylinder and he said that its strength to that kind of impact might not be the same. But that was 6 years ago and I know this is fast evolving technology,. That's not how it works for engine cylinders. You want things (cylinder/Piston/case) to heat up and cool down at the same rate, also the cross hatching is important to the design. The bigger things are, the more it matters. Not an gineer, but have heated things with a torch. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
aviatoreb Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 5 minutes ago, Yetti said: That's not how it works for engine cylinders. You want things (cylinder/Piston/case) to heat up and cool down at the same rate, also the cross hatching is important to the design. The bigger things are, the more it matters. Not an gineer, but have heated things with a torch. Do you know then if it is possible to 3d print a cylinder? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Yetti Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 29 minutes ago, aviatoreb said: Do you know then if it is possible to 3d print a cylinder? I think it would be weird. alot is know about heat treating of metals which realigns their particles to give them strength in various manners. I have a bunch of my grandfathers books on heat treating/blacksmithing. what was understood back in the day was learned through experience. printing then sintering would have to go through the same trials of time. So printing would be easy. How long it would last and perform would be learned. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Comet Posted March 23, 2020 Report Share Posted March 23, 2020 1 hour ago, aviatoreb said: Do you know then if it is possible to 3d print a cylinder? Sure it would be possible (in Al or Ti). Most as printed parts are very rough, so they would need post-processing to get the close tolerances needed for a cylinder (what they usually neglect to tell you when they show you the medical part with a mirror finish).. Metal AM parts have more inclusions and voids than cast metal, and they fail differently as well. The ideal would be to get CAD files for any part you might need, have it printed at a service bureau and install it as an owner supplied part. I’m not sure I would trust an AM part for a safety critical component. GE has invested a fortune to make the nozzles; including very stringent QA on not only the feedstock material, but also the additive machine itself (and they have hundreds; no two are identical). 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
carusoam Posted March 24, 2020 Report Share Posted March 24, 2020 9 hours ago, aviatoreb said: Do you know then if it is possible to 3d print a cylinder? Cheers, I think we have done it! We have gone in a complete, perfect circle... The OP IS a video of an aircraft cylinder that is being 3D printed... Of course, it is for a military style drone.... The part is designed to be printed... so it gets some excess support parts machined off.... (shown in the video) It probably gets its internal surface machined with cross hatches for improved lubrication... It has advantages in cooling fin design that can’t readily be cast... It costs a mint! If only made in small batches... Kevlar thermal degradation temperature... 850°F. It may lose its bullet resistance before then... Wearing a Kevlar vest above 800°F will probably make your blood boil... And other goofy things... Best regards, -a- Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chriscalandro Posted March 24, 2020 Report Share Posted March 24, 2020 (edited) One of the more interesting things 3d printing is bringing us is the development of different lattice structures. Structures that are potentially equally as strong as solid structures at fractions of the weight. There are a large number of uses for lattice structures with only some mentioned in the video. I don't see 3d printing as a great solution for finished products (I have some experience here) but it has accelerated research and development exponentially in a number of engineering fields. Edited March 24, 2020 by chriscalandro Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AH-1 Cobra Pilot Posted March 24, 2020 Author Report Share Posted March 24, 2020 (edited) To throw more questions into the mix, there are several different methods of 3-D printing metal. The most common is sintering layers of metal powder with a laser or electron beam. Another is blowing metal powder into a melt-pool created by a laser or beam. Structures of less than 10μ m can be built with either and the resulting parts are between casting and forging in strength. Note that most cast aluminum cylinders typically have a hardened steel sleeve in them, as would anything 3-D printed. You did not need these in the old, cast iron blocks. The true beauty of the 3-D printing is the optimization of the design, including being able to better fit any aircraft with better strength and better cooling with lighter weights. The present detractor is the price. 3-D printed products usually cost at least $1/g-$5/g. Once that comes down, we will see a revolution, except the FAA will be there blocking it. Edited March 24, 2020 by Ah-1 Cobra Pilot Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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