Program Jumpstarts AM-Ready Digital Parts Warehouse

As organizations weigh the potential of adding additive manufacturing (AM) technologies to the production mix, a chief hurdle involves identifying viable parts candidates—a process that is typically slow and dependent on months of analysis.

Most organizations take to a whiteboard or wrangle spreadsheets to catalog and analyze parts libraries. Engineers will typically screen parts by combing through various parts libraries and analyzing individual applications to determine which components might lend themselves to AM production based on design requirements and ROI.

EOS North America’s Additive Minds division is determined to streamline the process, pioneering an AM part screening methodology and set of collaborative processes aimed at helping organizations scale production. The team partnered with 3YOURMIND, an on-demand manufacturing platform that incorporates technology that helps engineers review part inventories to find the right use cases for on-demand manufacturing. The partnership is designed to help engineering organizations quickly scale part identification for AM based on the right strategies to achieve successful production and create robust digital parts libraries.

“We partnered with 3YOURMIND to help unlock AM’s potential by eliminating what historically required months of analysis, and instead allowing organizations to quickly generate business cases for on-demand, highly engineered applications,” said Fabian Alefeld, senior manager with Additive Minds.

3YOURMIND’s algorithms help teams conduct a thorough review of parts inventories based on technical and economic criteria and create a report of ready-to-use parts. As part of the partnership, EOS Additive Minds’ data is being used to improve the 3YOURMIND algorithms for more accurate prediction of costs and application printability. Together, the partners developed the Rapid Part Identifier software, which increases the speed of part screening for customers with large, traditionally manufactured application inventory while providing a comparative digital inventory of uploaded and evaluated parts.

The partners believe the Rapid Part Identifier program will help engineering organizations make quicker decisions through the ability to quickly scan existing parts in inventory and determine a better-defined AM business case. It also sets the beginning foundation to build an on-going digital parts library, says Dave Krzeminski, senior Additive Minds consultant at EOS. “EOS Additive Minds will leverage the program to launch a part screening evaluation, identify suitable AM parts, establish a business case, and help a customer onboard Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF) technology for production,” Kreminski says. “With hundreds or thousands of parts already uploaded into the 3YOURMINDS software and algorithms adjusted for customer-specific decision-making, organizations can then adopt the platform as an internal software tool to continue building a digital parts library.”

Watch this video to learn more about how 3YOURMIND helps engineers determine if a part is suitable for AM production.

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