38th network meeting at the AM Forum
As part of the AM Forum, the 38th network meeting Beam Melting took place in Berlin on July 4, 2023. Instead of the usual invited guest lectures, this time the AM Forum offered the opportunity for technical input, knowledge gain and experience exchange. Presentations from e.g. Airbus, BMW, MTU and Siemens provided network members with highly interesting insights into the industrial practice of additive manufacturing in these companies on the first day of the AM Forum. Afterwards, network members exchanged information on their planned and ongoing joint activities in the internal part of the network meeting.
On the evening before the network meeting, the network members had the opportunity to take a tour of the company and exchange ideas at the Berlin network member NANOVAL GmbH & Co. KG and at a subsequent joint dinner.
The network management would like to thank the hosts IPM AG (organizer of the AM Forum), especially Barbara Weingarten, as well as Christian Gerking, Managing Director at NANOVAL, for their hospitality!
The 39th network meeting is planned for Advent 2023.
37th network meeting at new network partner Schaeffler AG
On January 25, 2023, the 37th network meeting Beam Melting took place at one of our new members - Schaeffler AG - headquarters in Herzogenaurach. In addition to intensive discussions about current and future joint projects, the agenda included a factory tour that provided insight into the production of the Schaeffler plant at the site. In addition, three guest lectures offered numerous opportunities for thought and exchange.
For example, Dr. Thomas Papke, Sub-Cluster Manager (Schaeffler AG) showed application potentials of L-PBF in the Automotive Aftermarket division in his specialist lecture. Prof. Michael Schmidt (Institute of Photonic Technologies, Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg) explained customized component properties in powder-based additive manufacturing. Finally, Udo Ringler, Production Technology Engineer (Schaeffler AG) and Julian Waldmann, Business Development Manager Additive Manufacturing (Siemens AG) jointly presented how Schaeffler uses MaaS (Manufacturing as a Service) for internal AM services.
The network management would like to express its sincere thanks to the guest speakers and especially to Dr. Thomas Papke and Carsten Merklein, Vice President Advanced Manufacturing Technologies from the host Schaeffler for their comprehensive support in organizing the meeting and for providing the premises!
The 38th network meeting will take place in summer 2023.
John Deere is virtual host of "Tech Club"
AM along the value chain - Practical excerpts from material to digitalisation.
On 22 April 2021, the second Tech Club of Leichtbau BW will be virtually hosted by our network partner John Deere GmbH und Co. KG.
The second installment of this event series will once again focus on topics related to additive manufacturing.
Look forward to exciting lectures, digital networking opportunities and an exclusive tour of the host company.
Further information and registration on the event website (german).
John Deere finishes KitkAdd Project
After a little more than three years, the KitkAdd research project was successfully completed in March 2020. The aim of the KitkAdd research project was to reduce the overall manufacturing costs by combining additive manufacturing with established manufacturing processes such as machining, sintering and injection molding.
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As a result, a design method adapted to additive manufacturing is now available, which describes design recommendations and achievable manufacturing accuracies to the user. Industrial production concepts have been developed for the components under consideration, which enable a more economical production compared to the purely additive process chain. John Deere considered the additive manufacturing of gear components and heat exchangers in the project. A new type of process monitoring by means of acoustic sensor technology can now additionally minimize the resulting scrap. The 10 partners from industry and research in the joint project were funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF) in its programme "Innovations for tomorrow's production, services and work".
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