Custom Manufacturing Grabs More of the RP&M Market, 1 in a Series
Both the practical and the funky benefit from rapid-manufacturing techniques.
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December 1, 2008
By Pamela J. Waterman
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Customized manufacturing — it seems like an oxymoron, since manufacturing usually generates thousands of identical parts, yet it perfectly describes a growing approach to creating just what the market demands today.
Back in the early 1900s, when Henry Ford offered his cars in any color as long as it was black, he did so with good reason. His assembly lines ran quickly and smoothly working with just one set of auto-body parts. However, today’s customer has raised the expectations bar on products ranging from surgical implants to custom shoe inserts. Rapid manufacturing technologies offer very attractive solutions to optimize the economics of such challenges.
In this article DE explores a range of applications well under way in both customized manufacturing and mass customization. The former term refers to a cost-effective approach to generating a family of very similar products. Each one is based on a common design, which is then produced in hundreds or thousands, e.g., artificial hip joints in a dozen sizes. Mass customization describes the newer business model of creating many parts simultaneously or in quick succession, where each unit is completely unique but is defined by a sequence of consumer-tailored choices, e.g., online ordering of custom game figurines.
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The Right Fits for Medical Uses
One very successful custom manufacturing application is the direct-metal production of fully certified dental copings, i.e., the metal base of an actual tooth crown subsequently coated for final use. Rapid Quality Manufacturing (RQM) creates such parts from cobalt chrome metal powders on EOS’ laser-sintering equipment. Manufactured in batches of several hundred, the copings are customized to suit individual patients — no two pieces are exactly alike.
Production of each dental coping starts with a scan of either a dental impression of the teeth or, more recently, a scan of the patient’s actual teeth (this newer process is called Chair Side Oral Scanning; see August 2007 DE). This electronic data is sent to a dental lab where technicians review and clean the models and make any necessary adjustments. The lab then sends the revised file to a supplier such as RQM, which laser-sinters the metal substructure.
The cobalt chrome material, medically certified for actual end use, serves as a base on which the dental lab applies a final porcelain coating prior to its being cemented in the patient’s mouth. The result is a fast, cost-effective, high-quality crown. As anyone who has had one done will agree, a great fit without lots of in-chair rework is a welcome achievement. Each EOS machine can produce 200-300 copings a day. RQM is currently producing crowns and bridges for its partner, Quantum Technologies of Windsor Canada, and has targeted full-scale production with a second customer for late 2008.
Servicing both the dental and hearing-aid industries is In’Tech Industries of Ramsey, MN, operators of a fleet of high-end 3D Systems’ SLA Viper equipment. The company produces such high-resolution parts as fully custom earmolds for hearing aids and patterns for a range of dental end-applications.
