The

Limitations of 3D Printing in High Volume Manufacturing

The idea of 3D printing is as revolutionary and innovative as any; however, the current 3D
printing technology leaves much to be desired. 3D printing has established itself in a niche
market of affluent design teams for rapid prototyping and rapid tooling, leaving the vast
industry of manufacturing virtually untouched. Although the technology has taken massive
steps towards improving since its birth in the 1980s, a variety of issues still persist that
continue to limit its potential.

Todays traditional manufacturing processes are designed to keep up with the arduously
high-paced and high-volume market demands. 3D printing excels at highly intricate, low
volume parts with excessively long cycle times. In order for 3D printing technology to close
the gap between traditional manufacturing processes, a variety of issues must be
addressed.

The most obvious and most important gap that needs to be closed in order for 3D printing
to be successful in manufacturing is the speed at which 3D printers can print a part. As the
authors of this article state, An increase in 3D printing speed by a factor of 100 or more
would be necessary for the mass production of large parts. Depending on the size and
complexity of the part, it currently takes anywhere from a half-hour to a half-day, and
potentially even longer. A successful and profitable business plan cannot be founded on a
manufacturing process with cycle times as long as these, which is a major reason 3D
printing has not exploded into the manufacturing industry yet. Scientists have modified 3D
printers to print at much faster speeds; however, these printers compromise print quality
and require hours of manual work to remove excess material. Researchers have begun to
combat this tradeoff by developing variable speed printers that benefit from the high-
definition of slower printing speeds and from the high rate of material that is deposited by
higher printing speeds. Larry Greenemeir notes how crucial this research is; This is
getting a lot of attention now because people are seeing the limitations of the additive
process from a productivity standpoint.

One of the main reasons 3D printing has remained in the Rapid Prototyping industry for
so long is because of the reliability and repeatability issues it continues to have. While
repeatability is not a factor in the Rapid Prototyping industry, the repeatability of a part
from print to print, as well as from printer to printer is absolutely necessary in order to
become a reliable manufacturing process. Tolerancing is a crucial aspect in the design of
any part, and 3D printed parts must be able to meet specific tolerances to ensure parts will
be able to assemble together. One key characteristic of 3D printing that causes issues with
accuracy is the stair-stepping effect that occurs in the z-direction of a print as each layer is
stacked on one another. A variety of factors such as varying ambient temperatures and
excessive foreign vibrations also contribute to these repeatability issues. 3D printers are
currently designed to minimize these factors with temperature and vibration controlled
print areas, but accuracy problems persist. Scientists at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory
are currently working on self-monitoring 3D printers that use high speed cameras to
analyze the printing process and detect any flaws. These printers, in theory, would then be
able to address and fix a flaw as soon as it is printed, which would result in a major
improvement in reliability and repeatability. These new 3D printers are still in the
research stage of their development, although the potential for this technology seems to be
the favorite to propel 3D printing into the future.

3D printing has done an excellent job of developing around and even
surpassing the technology available to todays designers. 3D printers
were designed to print any part Computer-Aided Design (CAD)
systems could design, but they have progressed so much that CAD
systems can no longer design every part that 3D printers are capable
of printing. In order to grasp the full potential of 3D printing, CAD
systems must be redesigned in order to overcome the current
parametric boundary limitations of complex geometric designs. Such designs include
hollow-core and lattice structures, which reduce the weight of parts and can lead to
significant cost savings. Companies such as Materialise, NetFabb, and SimpleWare have
designed software to design hollow-core and lattice structures that cannot be
manufactured by traditional manufacturing processes. These companies have experienced

tremendous growth since launching their CAD software and will continue to thrive as more
and more engineers begin to utilize their software.

In the approximately thirty years since its beginning 3D printing
has advanced from printing a small range of plastics to printing a
variety of plastic, metallic, ceramic, digital and biological materials.
The capability to print in such a wide range of materials is one of 3D
printings more impressive attributes, but advancements are still
needed to continue to broaden the selection and application of these
materials. Organovo, a company that designs and 3D prints functional human tissues for
pharmaceutical drug testing, is currently working to advance their engineered tissue
applications to include surgical therapy and transplantations. Voxel8 is a company that is
developing the worlds first 3D electronics printer that will seamlessly integrate 3D circuit
components and wiring into plastic 3D printed parts. While
Organovo and Voxel8 are working to advance their respective fields,
researchers must continue to develop new metallic, plastic and
ceramic materials in order to start to put 3D printing on the same
playing field as the current manufacturing processes. The newest
3D printers are now being developed with multiple extrusion heads
in order to integrate multiple materials together to produce more
complex heterogeneous parts.

Today, 3D printing is a very serviceable technology for unique applications in the
manufacturing industry. If 3D printing technology can broaden its capabilities and
overcome some of its issues, it will develop into an all-around manufacturing machine that
can change the way products are made forever.