Additive Manufacturing

AUG 2015

Modern Machine Shop and MoldMaking Technology present ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING, a quarterly supplement reporting on the use of additive processes to manufacture functional parts. More at additivemanufacturinginsight.com.

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AdditiveManufacturingInsight.com August 2015 — 5 An external combustion engine, the Stirling engine promises to bring power to poor and remote parts of the world. Deka Research & Development's latest design is seen in the photo on the facing page. BJ Lanigan is one of the Deka employees working with additive manufacturing to try to make this type of engine more energy and cost effcient. The photo directly above shows one of the frst versions of the engine's heater head to be built from Mar-M 247. dramatic. If effcient and easily transportable Stirling engines can be sent into areas unreached by an electrical grid, then people in these areas could obtain usable power from whatever burn- able material they might have at hand. Deka is also developing a water purifer that could run off this engine. However, key to realizing all of this promise will be to achieve that needed effciency and trans- portability. As a result, this humanitarian challenge is inherently a manufacturing challenge. Machine Shop Manager BJ Lanigan is one of the Deka team members working on that chal- lenge. A resource he is now putting to use is a Concept Laser metal additive manufacturing machine Deka bought specifcally for Stirling engine work. With this machine, Lanigan is making parts aimed at testing and proving out the Deka team's various ideas for how to improve both the effectiveness and the manufacturability of critical components of the engine. Additive manufacturing's freedom to create complex geometries is well-known, and Deka is using that freedom to obtain intricate part geom- etries that seek to maximize thermal effciency. Yet there is also a second, equally important area of freedom provided by additive. The various work- piece materials that are common in machine shops are not the only materials that are available to use. The materials known to shops are known specif- cally because they are machinable. But when additive manufacturing makes a part that is nearly complete—that is, a part that requires only simple machining steps to complete it—then machinability is much less of a concern. The palette of potential alloys grows. For Deka, this means that the options for improving an uncommon engine have now expanded to include uncommon metals. Crazy Enough? Lanigan could be said to have spent much of his childhood around Deka. Dean Kamen hired his father and his maternal grandfather before Lanigan was born. Growing up, he visited the shop routinely, and at age 17 he joined the company as a third-generation employee. Most of his work here so far has focused strictly on parts and processes, he says, but now his focus has changed. Just under two years ago, he was appointed machine shop manager, a role he knows he will need to grow into and to fll with humility, because at age 31 within a company of experienced professionals, he is very nearly the youngest person in the shop. Deka has actually used 3D printing for many years. The company has been 3D printing plastic parts since the 1980s, and has an on-site 3D printing area with multiple machines. But when the

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