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Texas-based industrial 3D printer producer Essentium, Inc. has introduced that its Excessive-Velocity Extrusion (HSE) 3D printing platform and high-performance supplies have been licensed by Deutsche Bahn (DB), Germany’s nationwide railway firm. 

This additive manufacturing expertise will likely be used to 3D print practice elements and instruments. Essentium claims that its choices will permit DB to extend the provision of its fleet by enabling key parts to get replaced rapidly and effectively. 

The Essentium HSE 3D printer is predicated in Neumünster and has been examined with the corporate’s flame-retardant Essentium 9085 and HTN-CF25 thermoplastics. These supplies have demonstrated compliance with additive manufacturing requirements ISO-ASTM 52920:2023 and ISO 52930.       

“Lots of people nonetheless marvel if additive is prepared for prime time. Deutsche Bahn, which is 3D printing tens of 1000’s of alternative elements for its trains, proves it’s,” commented Essentium CEO Blake Teipel, Ph.D.  

“We sit up for advancing Deutsche Bahn’s AM capabilities to hurry repairs and hold its belongings operational with minimal downtime. This partnership will pave the best way for others within the rail and transport industries to observe.”

Deutsche Bahn certifies Essentium expertise 

DB will leverage Essentium’s 3D printing expertise to beat provide chain challenges and uncooked materials shortages for out of date elements. The HSE 3D printer and flame-retardant supplies will likely be utilized together with DB’s digital warehouse that homes round 1,000 digital technical drawings of spare elements. DB hopes to extend this quantity to 10,000 by 2030. 

DB will make use of Essentium’s supplies and the Neumünster-based HSE 3D printer to provide low-run elements on-demand, reasonably than manufacturing elements in massive portions. It will permit the corporate to restrict cupboard space, enhance supply speeds, and lower prices, Essentium claims.

Moreover, Essentium’s high-performance 3D printing supplies are highlighted as assembly the difficult railway trade requirements. Certainly, rolling inventory purposes are required to own excessive ranges of flame retardancy. Conventional thermoplastics usually possess poor mechanical properties and restricted fireplace efficiency, making them unsuitable for rail purposes. 

Able to withstanding 180℃, Essentium’s high-temperature thermoplastics are mentioned to satisfy trade requirements for reliability, repeatability, and efficiency, permitting DB to quickly 3D print rail-worthy elements.

3D printing alternative railway elements

This isn’t the primary time DB has turned to 3D printing to fabricate railway parts. Again in 2019, the corporate built-in metallic 3DMP 3D printing expertise from GEFERTEC to enhance the provision of hard-to-procure spare elements. 

The 3DMP course of permits fast manufacturing of near-net-shaped metallic blanks utilizing wire as a uncooked materials. This methodology affords a excessive build-up charge of as much as 600 cm³ per hour, making it excellent for the cost-effective manufacturing of huge metal, nickel-base, titanium or aluminum parts. DB utilized this 3DPM expertise to service automobiles for older locomotives, 3D printing now out of date elements. 

DB isn’t the one railway firm to make use of additive manufacturing expertise. In 2021, it was introduced that Kimya, the additive manufacturing supplies arm of expertise firm ARMOR, was 3D printing spare railway elements with its customized PEKK filament. 

The unnamed railway provider required a protecting cowl part developed again in 1982, and turned to Kimya to 3D print a small batch of the polymer half by the Kimya Manufacturing facility manufacturing service. Using a PEKK filament developed at Kimya’s R&D heart, Kimya Lab, the workforce was in a position to 3D print the protecting covers with lowered lead instances and price financial savings.           

“Designing a standard mould would have required an extended improvement time and generated prices that might solely be lined by producing 1000’s of elements. The Kimya Manufacturing facility affords our companions a fit-for-purpose completed product utilizing our personal supplies, all in small runs,” commented Kimya’s Enterprise Growth Director Pierre-Antoine Pluvinage.   

Elsewhere, France’s nationwide railway firm, the Société nationale des chemins de fer français (SNCF), makes use of the Agile PLM software program from 3D printing software program developer 3YOURMIND. SNCF adopted this software program in 2021, utilizing it to establish, consider, and retailer its additive manufacturing half knowledge to chop prices and streamline on-demand spare half manufacturing.   

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Featured picture reveals Deutsche Bahn trains. Photograph through Deutsche Bahn.