Page 20 - MetalForming October 2015

Additive Manufacturing
Fine Titanium Powders for Additive Manufacturing
ufacturers to elicit the benefits of titanium’s strength, light weight and corrosion resist- ance in advanced applications.
Praxair’s ability to produce large-scale volumes of titanium powders for additive manufacturing evolves from its experi- ence producing gas-atomized powders for thermal-spray coating. Further devel- opment of a proprietary atomization process designed specifically for titanium allows the company to make large batch- es of fine, titanium powder.
Praxair, Inc.’s Surface Technologies business unit announced plans to begin marketing fine, spherical titanium powder for use in 3D printing by additive manu- facturers serving the aerospace, auto- motive, industrial and medical markets. Metal printing with titanium enables man-
“Until now, there’s been limited avail- ability of fine, titanium powder in the mar- ketplace to create parts,” says Dean Hack- ett, vice president of advanced materials and equipment for Praxair Surface Tech- nologies.
“We use close-coupled, high-pressure gas atomization to produce fine, spherical tita- nium powder in large quantities,” says Andy Shives, additive manufacturing marketing manager for Praxair Surface Technologies. www.praxairsurfacetechnologies.com
Additive Industries Introduces Industrial 3D-Printing System
Additive Industries, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, has introduced a new indus- trial 3D printing system, MetalFab1. It is said by company officials to be the first inte- grated metal additive manufacturing sys- tem designed for high-end industrial appli- cations in markets such as aerospace, defense, medical, high-tech equipment, tooling and automotive. In debuting Met- alFab1, Additive Industries seeks to take 3D metal printing beyond the current lab and prototyping use, to actual fabrica- tion use on the factory floor.
The reproducibility of MetalFab1 takes its inspiration from the semiconductor industry, according to company officials. Stability is achieved by robust machine design in combination with a continuous calibration strategy. Fully automated han- dling connects all process steps to reduce manual labour, improve product consis- tency and quality, and increase operator safety. Its modular architecture allows users to start with basic machine con- figurations with the possibility to enlarge the scope of the process, enabling sub- stantially increased productivity. And, modules can be added to allow use of mul- tiple materials in one machine without hav- ing to clean the powder system and run the risk of cross-contamination. www.additiveindustries.com
18 MetalForming/October 2015
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