Automotive 3D Printing

In a webinar hosted by Messe Frankfurt, 3D printing experts highlighted innovations that are redefining the definites of automotive.

- Deepti Thore

Messe Frankfurt’s recent webinar brought together experts from organisations including Imaginarium, Design Tech and Divide by Zero. Titled ‘3D Printing to redefine efficiency, cost-effectiveness and productivity for Automotive Industry’, the webinar hosted by Automotive Engineering Show, Chennai, drew attention to the innovative trends in the domain known to have brought about a transformation in the automotive industry. Citing the stakeholder measures to avoid stocking excess inventory besides saving on raw material and unutilised tech, the session opened with the panel unanimously agreeing upon the benefits it has to offer. Among key advantages spoken of were hopeful of being able to avoid long development lead times and nonvalidated designs for production.

3D printing, also known as Additive Manufacturing (AM) involves printing a part layer by layer from a digital design which is in the form of the 3D CAD model. No special tools like a cutting tool or moulds are known to be involved in this process. The part is directly manufactured or printed onto a print bed. Being majorly used for rapid prototyping in the past for the automotive industry, 3D printing, the panellists agreed was fast becoming a prefered choice to create visual models, functional parts, spare parts, jigs and fixtures and in rapid tooling. Stressing on how 3D printing was helping to speed up the design process, improve quality and cut costs, Nishant Shah, Director, Imaginarium (India) Pvt. Ltd. said, “A decade back it used to take months to actually manufacture some parts after designing and to ultimately test the functionality. 3D printing has certainly helped to reduce this time down to a fraction of days and even hours in cases.”