AdditiveManufacturingInsight.com May 2015 — 5
Mazak's Integrex i-400AM actually uses
two of the Hybrid heads, one for quickly
growing rough forms and one for
growing fne ones. With this capability, the
Mazak machine can perform additive and
subtractive operations in a single cycle.
give it additive capability. Practically any CNC
machining center that can accommodate the
head in its tool magazine and toolchanger could
employ this head to realize both additive manu-
facturing and subtractive CNC machining within
the same machining cycle. An older machine
tool could thus be retroftted to become one of
the most capable machine tools in the shop.
Precisely why Hybrid won the award for
this product is—strictly speaking—impossible
to say. Ten judges from industry, academia,
the military and manufacturing media each
independently evaluated various additive manu-
facturing innovations according to 10 criteria
apiece. The winner was determined from the
accumulation of all of these scores. However, I
was one of the judges. I can say this much: To
me—and, I suspect, to other judges as well—
what is compelling about Hybrid's innovation is
not just its technical merits, but also what it sug-
gests about additive manufacturing's future.
Today, the successes with additive manufac-
turing generally involve stand-alone machines that
are dedicated to an additive process. Powder-bed
machines for 3D printing of metal parts are the
chief example of what I mean. The reliability and
sophistication of these machines has reached the
point that manufacturers are now making signif-
cant investments in them and relying on them to
mass-produce critical, geometrically complex
parts. GE Aviation's additive production of LEAP
engine fuel nozzles is a leading example of this.
But do applications such as this one represent
the extent of how additive manufacturing will be
employed? Does additive manufacturing have to
be an altogether separate way to make parts?
Hybrid's innovation offers an additional pos-
sibility. Additive manufacturing might also be an
expansion upon the way we make parts currently.
Few who have used additive manufacturing see it
as a replacement for CNC machining, which will
continue to provide the fastest and most precise