Navies view our 3D printing technology

CDU’s 3D printer was front and centre at the Northern Territory’s display at Pacific 2019, an international maritime exposition event aimed at Indo-Asia-Pacific region.

The three-day event in Sydney attracted more than 21,000 people and 182 industry, government, defence and scientific delegations from 48 nations, including 45 international naval delegations and 21 Chief of Navy counterparts from across the region.

Using a LightSPEE3D printer’s cold spray technology, the Advanced Manufacturing Alliance (AMA) has produced parts that meet military specifications. The CDU-based AMA is an open alliance founded by the start-up company that invented the printer, SPEE3D, and CDU.

AMA Director, CDU’s Dr Rebecca Murray said the event provided important opportunities for dialogue with potential end-users of the printer’s cold spray technology.

“Not only do we get to promote the technology’s attributes, we also get to hear what the possible applications for it might be in the manufacture of defence components direct from the suppliers themselves,” Dr Murray said.

Manufacturing parts for use in the maritime environment is one of the strengths of the technology.

The way the technology works means it’s ideal for producing metal parts that have a greater resistance to corrosion than traditional manufacturing processes.

“We can keep the strength and weight attributes of a part and build it in a way that gives it much greater ability to withstand corrosion, which of course is a great source of metal degradation in the marine environment,” Dr Murray said.

“This is on top of the technology’s ability to be a turn-key manufacturing solution for a range of defence parts.”

AMA Mechanical Engineer, Micah Thorbjornsen said a wide spectrum of defence manufacturing players expressed interest in incorporating the 3D printing technology into their manufacturing programs.

“We also had interest from defence technology providers who were interested in the potential to integrate the 3D technology, with other technological advances in manufacturing, to produce parts for military use,” he said.

Defence innovation programs also were interested in the capacity of the 3D printing technology to be used in a ship-board environment to increase part self-sustainability.