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STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Project:
Is 3D Printing/Additive Manufacturing Truly the Future of Manufacturing?
Name of Course:
Engineering Economics & Cost Analysis
Course #:
EM 600 A
Due on:
May 11th, 2016
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Is 3D Printing/Additive Manufacturing Truly the Future of Manufacturing?
It is not something new on how effective 3D modeling can be when printing an object
with very high tolerances (Shapes and Angles), while improving the manufacturing (rapid
prototyping, affordability and versatility) in the last several years we have seen how this can
potentially change the manufacturing industry overall.
Let’s start by the Ease of creating complex objects; this has always been very difficult in
traditional manufacturing which requires a great amount of precision and skills even for
computerized manufacturing industries. When having the tolerances off, this means that the
part may have to be scraped which will affect the resources, money and time for both, the
customer and the manufacturer. On other hand, having these difficult parts for assembly may
trigger another question: Are we required to assemble by a person or a machine? Etc.
This is one of the reasons why manufacturing is using 3D printing as a problem solver. We
can create an entire piece in one process by simplifying the way we manufacture parts and
is why Additive Manufacturing (AM) comes into place, instead of creating each object and
then having to assemble to complete the product (Traditional Manufacturing).
Equipment, Setup and O&M costs for Additive Manufacturing vs. Traditional
Manufacturing:
There are numerous processes that AM requires in order to succeed. Many companies
have created unique systems and materials to categorize the processes and material using
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standard methods. The ASTM International Committee F42.91 on Additive Manufacturing
Technologies has developed standard terminologies:
- Binder Jetting: This process uses liquid bonding agent deposited using an inkjet-print
head to join powder materials in a powder bed.
- Directed Energy Deposition: This process utilizes thermal energy, typically from a laser,
to fuse materials by melting them as they are deposited.
- Material Extrusion: These machines push material, typically a thermoplastic filament,
through a nozzle onto a platform that moves in horizontal and vertical directions.
- Material Jetting: This process, typically, utilizes a moving inkjet-print head to deposit
material across a build area.
- Powder Bed Fusion: This process uses thermal energy from a laser or electron beam to
selectively fuse powder in a powder bed.
- Sheet Lamination: This process uses sheets of material bonded to form a three-
dimensional object.
- Vat Photo-polymerization: These machines selectively cure a liquid photopolymer in a
vat using light.
There are two primary types of materials: Plastic and Metals. In this category we also have
ceramics, composites, and other materials that are used as well but are not as common such
as:
- Polymers and polymers blends
- Sand molds and cores
- Papers and others.
Some of these processes lend themselves to certain materials which the following table will
represent.
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Table 1: Additive Manufacturing Process and Material Combinations
There are two categories for examining additive manufacturing costs. This is to compare
additive manufacturing to other traditional manufacturing such as injection molding and
machining. The purpose of this examinations is to determine under what circumstances it is
cost effective. The second category involves identifying resource use at various steps. The
purpose of this type of analysis is to identify when and where resources are being consumed
and whether there can be a reduction in resource use.
As discussed by Son K. Young on “A Cost Estimation Model for Advanced Manufacturing
Systems” in 1991, the costs of productions can be categorized in two ways. The first involves
those costs that are well structured such as labor, material and machine costs. The second
involves ill structured costs such as those associated with build failure, machine setup, and
inventory.
When looking at the Traditional Manufacturing, we should also identify the waste into
categories such as:
1) Over Production: This occurs when more is produces than is currently required.
2) Transportation: Transportation doesn’t make any change to the product and is a
source of risk.
3) Reworks/Defects: Defective parts may result in wasted resources or extra costs on
correcting the reworks.
4) Over Processing: This occurs when more work is done than is necessary.
5) Motion: Work made that is unnecessary may result in extra expenditure of time and
resources.
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6) Inventory: This is similar to “Over Production” and results in the need for additional
handling, space, people and paperwork to manage extra products.
7) Waiting: When employees are waiting for materials and parts or machinery, this may
result in wasted resources.
This is where Additive Manufacturing may impact a significant number of these categories.
One example, AM may significantly reduce the need for large amount of inventory, which is
a significant cost in manufacturing.
As of Reeves P. on a conference held in Florida in 2008, “How the Socioeconomic Benefits of
Rapid Manufacturing can Offset Technological Limitations”; Many of the costs are hidden in
the supply chain, which is a system that moves products form supplier to customer. AM may
potentially, have significant impacts on the design and size of this, reducing its associated
costs.
The supply chain includes purchasing, operations, distribution and integration. Purchasing
involves sourcing product suppliers. A research made by the University of San Francisco to
“Walmart: Key to Successful Supply Chain Management” says that Operations involve
demand planning, forecasting and inventory. Distribution involves the movement of
products and integration involves creating an efficient supply chain.
Reducing the need for these activities can result in a reduction in costs. Some large
companies owe their success to the effective management of their supply chain. They have
used technology to innovate the way they track inventory and restock shelves resulting in
reduced costs. Walmart for instance, cut links in the supply chain, making the link between
their stores and the manufacturers more direct. It also began vender managed inventory
(VMI), where manufacturers were responsible for managing their products in their
warehouses. If additive manufacturing reduces the number of links in the supply chain and
brings production close to consumers, it will result in a reduction in the vulnerability to
disasters and disruptions.
The following figure provides an example that compares traditional manufacturing to
additive manufacturing. Under TM, material resource providers deliver to the manufacturers
of parts and components, who might deliver parts and components to each other and then
to an assembly plant. From there the assembled product is delivered to a retailer or
distributer. A disruption at any of the points in manufacturing or assembly may result in late
deliveries. AM with localized production does not have the same vulnerability. First, there
may not be any assembly of parts or components. Second, a disruption to manufacturing
does not impact all of the retailers and distributers.
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Figure 1: Example of Traditional Supply Chain vs. Additive Suppy Chain.
Material Costs: with geometric freedom, AM allows products to be reproduces using less
material while maintaining the necessary performance. Products can be produced at the
level of performance needed rather than significantly exceeding the necessary performance
level because of limitations in traditional manufacturing. In the actuality, the pricing of the
materials for AM can most often exceed those from TM. Metal and Plastic are the primary
materials used and can be quite high when compared to the Traditional Manufacturing; this
price may be 80% greater or even as 10x more expensive.
Other research, confirms that material costs are the major decline aspect when evaluating
additive manufacturing vs. traditional manufacturing.
The next figure presents the data for a sample part made of Stainless Steel. This example
shows 4 factors with production quantity less than 200 pieces for the base case. This analysis
provides the insight into identifying the largest costs of additive manufacturing.
Figure 2: Cost Distribution of AM of Metal Parts by varying factors.
The first factor that is varied is the building rate, which is the speed at which additive
manufacturing systems operates. In this example, it is measured in cubic centimeters per
hour (ccm/h). The second factor that is varied is the machine utilization measured as the
number of hours per year (h/yr) that the machine is operated. The third factor is the material
cost and the last factor is the machine investment costs which includes the housing, using
and maintaining of the AM systems (€/kg). Among other things, this includes the energy
costs, machine purchase, and labor costs of operating system. The base model is represented
