SME Media

08/11/2022

Ceramics Expo is just 3 weeks away!

Discover everything you need to know about , using their show preview!

It’s the perfect chance to get a taste of the event before planning your visit. Check it out and register for your free place: https://fal.cn/3qXRf

08/10/2022

Stacey DelVecchio says the percentage of women working in the engineering field remains low, despite years of ongoing industry recruitment and education initiatives, in a recent Voices AMplified article: https://fal.cn/3qW4b. “It’s around 15% and has stayed that way for some time now,” she said. “And unfortunately, the problem doesn’t come so much from the number of women entering the field as it does those who are leaving it.”

Why? Studies by both the Society of Women Engineers and Harvard Business Review show they find too many obstacles to attaining their goals and “Female students do as well or better than male students in school—but often point to the hegemonic masculine culture of engineering itself as a reason for leaving.” Read the article for more.

08/08/2022

It’s official. Additive manufacturing is thriving and continues to gain momentum with successes across diverse applications, according to Suzy Marzano, ’s senior manager, Industry Development and Technical Activities, in a recent Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3qRK5).

In addition to ongoing technology advances, AM’s growth is fueled by a host of engaged companies, organizations, and dedicated professionals, all of whom are energized and passionate about developing, implementing—and sharing—new ideas and best practices throughout a collaborative community of innovators. Suzy leads this area for SME.

08/08/2022

So You Want to Build a Smart Factory. How Will You Identify, Prioritize and Implement the Use Cases That Deliver the Biggest Impact? – An Ericsson Case Study - Ericsson Inc

In this informative webinar, members from Ericsson’s smart factory team will explore the journey Ericsson went through to select, prioritize and deploy impactful use cases in its Lewisville smart factory using a private cellular network. Register here!

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08/05/2022

What’s in a name? Despite running a business named Met-L-Flo, Inc., that features metal additive manufacturing, Carl Dekker says in an Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3qOiQ ), “Yes, we also do plastic!”

He and his team of 20 oversee five of the seven ASTM-recognized AM technologies. These include vat photopolymerization, material extrusion, material jetting, binder jetting, and powder bed fusion (the latter in both metal and polymer). Within this list are several AM subcategories, such as Carbon’s Digital Light Synthesis (DLS) and 3D Systems’ MultiJet Printing (MJP). Read more about Carl and the company at the above link!

08/04/2022

So You Want to Build a Smart Factory. How Will You Identify, Prioritize and Implement the Use Cases That Deliver the Biggest Impact? – An Ericsson Case Study - Ericsson Inc

We have an exciting webinar coming up next week with Ericsson! Learn how to implement the use cases that deliver the biggest impact from Ericsson's smart factory team. Register now!

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08/04/2022

Olga Ivanova has 3D-printed plenty of interesting parts during her time in manufacturing – Rocket nozzles, turbine blades and impellers, neonatal tracheostomy tubes. But to Star Wars fans, it’s the Static Dissipative Yoda that’s most intriguing, which you can see and read about in a recent Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3qMhq).

“We printed a bunch of Yoda and Groot (Guardians of the Galaxy) figurines for high school students who visited our facility recently,” said Ivanova, director of technology at Mechnano, an additive manufacturing materials developer near Phoenix. “It’s our way of getting young people interested in additive manufacturing.”

07/28/2022

John Meyer of APWORKS GmbH always thought he was destined to be an aircraft designer. In a recent SME Voices AMplified podcast (https://fal.cn/3qBkm) he shared that as the offspring of parents who flew gliders recreationally, aviation seemed to be in his DNA.

After studying mechanical engineering and taking a position at Airbus, a colleague introduced him to additive manufacturing, and as he said, “I was a sucker for it and then I spent the next couple of years figuring out how can I get from what I'm doing today which was working on the A-350 program to work in this technology space that's emerging that is incredibly cool.” Read about it at this link: https://fal.cn/3qBkm

07/27/2022

So You Want to Build a Smart Factory. How Will You Identify, Prioritize and Implement the Use Cases That Deliver the Biggest Impact? – An Ericsson Case Study - Ericsson Inc

Have you ever wanted to know how companies implement the use cases that deliver the biggest impact? Register for this informative webinar with Ericsson to learn how they successfully implemented their factory use cases!

Join us

07/21/2022

Stacey DelVecchio of StaceyD Consulting learned five key lessons in her 32 years at Caterpillar in manufacturing that she shares with attendees at industry events – some that still are a work in progress. In a recent Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3qqys) she shared them, which include:

• Know Yourself
• Find Something That Gives Your Life Meaning
• Be Decisive
• Speak Your Mind
• Enjoy the Ride
“I was responsible for the additive manufacturing strategy that Caterpillar had and helped put it in place,” she said. “Much of that entailed building a team and developing the various tools needed to run the department, but once we got to that point, the primary thing that I personally worked on was helping the different application and product groups understand the value of additive. That meant doing business cases on why it made sense, and in many instances, why it didn’t.” Read more in detail at the above link.

07/20/2022

When it comes to galactic travel, Bryan McEnerney of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory employed 3D-printing to manufacture numerous components of not only the Mars Perseverance Rover, but also for projects destined for Venus, Earth’s moon, various asteroids and even outer planets. Why AM? In a recent Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3qoFL) he said faster build times, intricate design elements, weight reduction and resistance to vibration and pressure were important drivers.

“Just to make a casting might require six months or more, and it would not come anywhere close to delivering the multifunctional capabilities possible with AM. That’s why I hope to apply the methodology behind our propulsion module to any extra-planetary craft,” he said.

07/15/2022

Fun Fact: The Wright brothers bought tubing to build bicycles from Greg Morris’ family steel distribution business, according to legend, as told by Greg in this Voices AMplified podcast interview: https://fal.cn/3qha2. Greg, who started his career in that business, soon caught the entrepreneurial bug and landed on “a crazy technology” (his emphasis) called rapid prototyping.

Listen to Greg talk about his early journey through rapid prototyping into CNC machining, urethanes and different additive technologies before introducing Direct Metal Laser Sintering in North America.

07/13/2022

Nanoparticles are small, and XJet’s are truly tiny. But XJet’s Dror Danai asks how many of its proprietary nanoparticles do you think can fit into just one of the metal grains used in laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) or bound metal deposition (BMD) processes. The answer is “hundreds of thousands, and you can read more about it in a recent Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3qdhI)

Danai explained that because the particles are much smaller than those used in competing systems, the shrinkage amount during sintering is commensurately smaller. And since XJet prints a green part rather than building a fused metal one, there’s none of the internal, non-isotropic stresses generated during a thermal printing process. Simple, right? Click the link about for more.

07/12/2022

In a recent Voices Amplified, (https://fal.cn/3qb28), Todd Grimm of T.A. Grimm & Associates said additive manufacturing offers makers so many options that it suffers from “choice overload.” While this can be seen by some as a good problem to have, he says the number of options is overwhelming and confusing. In many cases with AM, he said, choice stymies growth. Read more at the link above!

07/07/2022

In a recent Voices AMplified podcast interview (https://fal.cn/3q3tR), Materialise Founder & CEO Fried Vancraen talked about some of his company’s wins and misses during its first 30 years, including being at the forefront of opening more potential for AM.

“Materialise was the very first company to believe that you could make medical models or 3D printed models from medical images, and we really went for it,” he said. “We enabled this – it’s something about which we will always be proud.” Hear the entire interview at https://fal.cn/3q3tR.

07/06/2022

Nora Touré, like many women working in additive manufacturing during AM’s early years, experienced difficulties in being accepted. In talking with female colleagues, many had the same experiences, often wondering if it was due to her being a woman in a traditionally male industry. In a recent Voices AMplified article (https://fal.cn/3q1mC) she talks about how these discussions were the impetus for the formation of Women in 3D Printing.

“What started as a one-year project to highlight a few of the women I’d come to know just grew and grew until I had women from all over the world reaching out to me for help with sharing their stories.” Today, Touré’s organization includes 80 chapters in 36 countries and six continents and has highlighted more than 400 3D printing professionals in what has since become a weekly post on the Wi3DP website.

07/05/2022

Bryan McEnerney of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory says additive manufacturing (AM) using ceramics in rocket engines remains a challenging endeavor that is well beyond bathroom tiles and fine dinnerware in a recent issue of ’s Voices AMplified: https://fal.cn/3pZBe.

He says that many of the scientific papers he’s collaborated on don’t even mention the word ceramic, preferring to stick to materials such as AISi10Mg, polyetheretherketone, or PEEK.