Design for Additive Manufacturing Conference: What is the future of products?

Additive Manufacturing (AM) is on the verge to industrial serial production. First companies in aerospace, automotive and medical have qualified AM and are currently ramping up their production. At the same time, many fail to implement additive technologies early on in the design phase.

AM Dampening Element ©Fraunhofer IAPT

Design for AM is mandatory for additive serial production

In order to identify the economic benefit and customer advantage with Additive Technologies it is mandatory to consider the geometrical freedom as well as the manufacturing restriction from the beginning of the design process. One example is the integration of complex biomimetic structures and their transformation to manufactural shapes. For example, structural optimization and biomimetic principles allow to reduce the weight and cost of part of about 30 %. However, reducing weight with structural optimization is just a start.

New design approaches for AM are developing

Other new design approaches for AM like generative design, heat exchange, multi-physical design or vibration damping are latest trends in the AM design community. They promise to increase the effectiveness of AM parts while allowing the technology to conquer new fields of application.

Skill building is an essential challenge

With all the technical progress, it is necessary to develop new software and technology skills. For many companies and individuals building up these specific new competencies is a major challenge. The additive academy is facing this challenge with dedicated training programs and events.

Join the Design for AM conference on May 27^th, 2021

The next free online event will be the DfAM conference on May 27^th. Experts from industry and research will present the actual developments in Design for Additive Manufacturing on this half-day event. They will talk about new AM functionalities, cost reduction, biomimetic design and the progress of additive design software.

For further information and free registration, please visit http://dfam-conference.com/