Large Format Additive Manufacturing to make end use parts for the USAF

A former grocery store in middle Georgia is now serving as Air Force Advanced Technology and Training Center.

The center employs now about 30 people and may eventually employ about 100. This lab is the second one like it in the Air Force. The first one is connected with Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Dayton, Ohio.

The facility is a satellite operation of Robins Air Force Base. It officially opened Oct. 24, and involves 3D Printing, also called Additive Manufacturing, as a key technology. Previously, 3D Printing had been thought of primarily as something to make prototypes, but now the Air Force is looking at using it to make end use parts.

The inside of the brick building —a former Publix store in Warner Robins— is full of gleaming new futuristic machinery, with large and very large format 3D Printers and 3D Scanners as starrings: In words of Maj. Ben Steffens, “Much of the work that has been done on the base has been done in the same method for years and years. This equipment, this technology, this material that we are dealing with here is cutting edge and will bring us to the next level as far as keeping our schedule down, keeping our cost low.”

The defense industry is expanding the use of 3D printing

In 2012, the Pentagon established the National Additive Manufacturing Innovation Institute in Youngstown, Ohio, and many companies are using 3D printing more regularly in the manufacturing process. This technology, which makes manufacturing more agile and wastes very little material, is already being used aboard the USS Essex, a U.S. Navy amphibious assault ship. In words of Adm. James Winnefeld, vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “The crew has printed everything from plastic syringes to oil tank caps, to the silhouettes of planes that are used on the mock-up of the flight deck to keep the flight deck organized”

Actually, the Pentagon is using 3D Printers and 3D Production Systems across the military services for multiple purposes not only in the R&D labs but also in the battlefield: "When needed, an item can be printed from an electronic blueprint or scanning an existing part. Just the U.S. Navy has about 70 3D printing, or additive manufacturing, projects at dozens of sites" Winnefeld said.

Regarding private companies, defense giant Lockheed Martin is using 3D printers to manufacture jigs and fixtures used to build the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter: “We use hundreds of 3D-printed tools for F-35 manufacturing, such as bracket locators and drill templates,” Lockheed spokesman Mark Johnson said. 

El SMC apuesta por la Manufactura Aditiva

El U.S. Air Force Space and Missile Systems Center (SMC) ha firmado con la compaía UES Inc. (Dayton, OH) un contrato por valor de 2.9 millones de dólares (financiado por el Fondo de Innovación Rápida de la USAF) para investigar y desarrollar nuevas tecnologías de Manufactura Digital Aditiva, susceptibles de ser aplicadas en el desarrollo de nuevos y más avanzados sistemas de misiles. El UES contará para este proyecto con la colaboración de otras empresas del sector aeroespacial y militar, entre las que destacan Faraday Technology Inc. y Aerojet Rocketdyne, ambas con sede en California.