3D Printing and Additive Manufacturing: Technologies, Applications, and Future Directions

摘要

3D printing or additive manufacturing has become a revolutionary technology that is expected to disrupt a lot of industries. A simple tool for rapid prototypes grew up into the manufacturing method we have now developed. It is possible to generate complex shapes and functional components almost of any kind of material, enabling a new freedom in design and manufacturing. This book is a comprehensive guide to the wide and diverse world of 3D printing and related techniques. We’ll take a look at how it’s being used in applications today, the design considerations you should keep in mind, and how this new technology could continue to evolve in the future. We want to provide you with a comprehensive overview of how 3D printing is molding sectors and the world at large. In order to really get a sense of the significance of 3D printing, one must relate it to the context of technology and history that it has emerged from. The idea of layer wise material buildup, a fundamental aspect of additive manufacturing, originated in the 1980s as an approach to rapid prototyping. Prior to 3D printing, rapid prototyping was a time-consuming and costly affair due to the drawbacks of sharp edged tools, subtractive cutting methods, the frequent human errors, manual skill requirements, and lathe notching among the subtractive cutting methods, that are detrimentally persistent in these technologies, resulting in limited efficiency and tight dimensional tolerances, a significant amount of waste material, and labour-intensiveness. 3D printing was a game changer, it allowed designers and engineers to a produce precision, intricate models straight from a digital file cutting time and costs in half. More and more, 3D printing has become part of the production shop floor and research laboratory, not to mention kitchen table. Photo One great benefit of this technology is that it can process plastics, metals, ceramics, biomaterials and food. The ability to generate custom products where there is demand, without expensive molds or tools, has opened up vast fields of opportunity in aerospace, medicine and fashion. This flexibility makes businesses can tailor themselves in a personal level – therefore easier to be creative. And pot calling kettle, it’s not hyperbole to say that 3D printing is transforming manufacturing from a world where things are made to one where they are created, in which objects of every summer and continent (from design classics to human body parts) do not come into being end masse but custom-erupt in orgy of form and (your) function. By journeying through the current and future potential of 3D printing, this book will launch you into the innovative and emergent world of 3D printing. We’ll examine in much more detail how 3D printing is already revolutionizing traditional manufacturing. This capability results in rapid iterations of designs, shorter lead times, and less waste, leading to an overall more efficient and sustainable process. Such advances do not only lead to cost reductions, but also support sustainable developments considering that the additive manufacturing techniques usually demand less material and energy compared to conventional manufacturing. The most exciting possibility with 3D printing is the opportunity to democratise manufacturing. Small companies, entrepreneurs and inventors now have access to production capability that, in the past, only large budgeted, specialty facility serviced corporations did. And then also 3D printing is, I feel like, taking a bit sort of like some of the extremes of what we can do with design even too. It’s allowing new possibilities in design that in many cases were not achievable before, letting designers push around more extreme forms and structures that do more than simply look cool. Cost of complex production: Traditional manufacturing does a bad job of enabling the production of complex products. Products are designed according to the limitations of the production process. Additive man