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According to the current form of heat source, metal 3D printing can be divided into laser (single-mode) SLM, laser (multi-mode) LENS, electron beam (powder) EBM, electron beam (wire) EBFF and arc WAAM.

Xinghai Group uses self-developed laser technology, currently mainly using SLM and LENS technology, and the materials are all in the form of powder.

Judging from the current equipment model, parts of 1000mm*800mm*600mm can be manufactured. If you want to increase the size of the parts, it is not difficult to increase the length of the guide rail. However, the accuracy will have a certain impact.

For a long time, the development of global metal 3D printing does not seem to have achieved the expected revolutionary development. Take Velo3D, the world's representative metal 3D additive company, as an example.

There are three main factors.

First, the material structure is poor, and it has not reached the level of forgings.

Maybe some properties of the components have reached the level of forgings with the same composition, but the material structure is still not up to the level.

At present, Xinghai Group has solved this key problem.

Second, the problem of manufacturing efficiency.

Generally speaking, the manufacturing efficiency of SLM technology is 5-20 cubic centimeters per hour, and if it is LENS (poor material organization), it can reach 10-80 cubic centimeters, or even 300 cubic centimeters.

Take the manufacture of steel as an example, the density of steel is 7.85 grams per cubic centimeter.

That is to say, the hourly manufacturing efficiency of metal 3D additive, SLM technology is about 40-160 grams, while LENS is 80-2400 grams, continuous manufacturing 24 hours a day, up to more than 50 kilograms.

In the case of titanium alloys and aluminum alloys, the weight per unit of production is lower due to the lower density.

The higher the manufacturing efficiency, the correspondingly lower forming accuracy.

Therefore, this technology is only suitable for manufacturing structural parts with very high complex procedures and small batches.

For traditional mechanical manufacturing (such as turning, milling, planing, grinding, drilling), the manufacturing cost of parts increases exponentially with the increase in complexity, and is related to the manufacturing batch. When the batch is less than 3,000 pieces, the cost is very high.

The complexity of the part has little effect on the cost of additive manufacturing. The additive manufacturing process is hardly affected by the complexity of the part, and its cost is mainly determined by the time required to manufacture the part.

Additive manufacturing therefore has a significant competitive advantage for single-piece low-volume production and parts with high geometric complexity.

Today, Xinghai Group has made great progress in SLM and LENS technology, and the efficiency of the number of single guns is 3 times to 5 times faster than the top equipment in the same industry.

The reasons for this are mainly the advantages of faster empty lines, scanning speed, multi-channel powder feeding, multi-laser beams, and faster melting efficiency.

Moreover, Xinghai Group's equipment can be configured with multiple guns to run simultaneously, and can be equipped with up to 3 spray guns.

Adding more guns means adding more shafts and taking up space. This is not the most important thing, but it is mainly to solve the algorithm problem of synchronous operation.

Therefore, the equipment using 3 guns can be 5-15 times faster than the top equipment in the same industry.

If the processing price is calculated, the difference is very large.

In the absence of specially designed parts, additive manufacturing will be expensive to produce until 2022, and industrial additive manufacturing systems are also valuable and some are slow to produce.

The total cost of additive manufacturing systems and equipment capable of producing metal parts currently ranges from about $500,000 to over $1 million.

If calculated at 80% of the operating time of the year, the metal 3D printing system operates about 7,000 hours per year.

For high-tech equipment, a two-year return on investment (ROI) is a reasonable average for costing, which means that depending on the value of the equipment, the hourly equipment operating cost (or equipment depreciation cost) per hour is $37 to $90 per hour.

The electricity consumption and the cost of the inert gas argon are not very large, about 10 yuan per hour, which is extremely low compared to the depreciation cost of the equipment.

If a stainless steel 304 structural part is processed, the weight is 1 kg, and the cost of powder material is 500 yuan.

According to the international metal 3D additive equipment, if the operating cost of the equipment is 400 yuan per hour.

The highest precision is required, the slowest processing time is about 25 hours, and the cost is = 25*400+500+25*10=10750 yuan!

The required accuracy is general, the processing time is about 5 hours, and the cost is =5*400+500+5*10=2550 yuan.

With Xinghai Group's equipment, if the price of the equipment is the same as the price of the raw materials, the processing time may only take 5 hours, or even half an hour at the earliest, the cost is 800-3050 yuan, and the precision is higher.

But no matter how cheap it is, the cost is still higher than traditional manufacturing.

Third, surface roughness and subsequent processing issues.

After all, 3D additive equipment is a way of surfacing materials, and the surface roughness is definitely worse than that of precision machining.

The general surface roughness is Ra5-50!

Generally speaking, the roughness of the holes drilled by the radial drilling machine is about Ra12.5, and the lines can be touched by hand.

Better, it can be processed to Ra6.3, which is almost the same as rough milling and rough turning.

If it is Ra25-50, it is very rough like the cutting surface cut by flame.

If post-processing is also used, there is no point in using 3D additive equipment.

And Xinghai Group's equipment, if using LENS, can reach Ra6.3 when the production efficiency is 200-1000 cubic centimeters per hour. If the requirements are not high, there is no need for further processing.

If SLM is used, the surface roughness Ra can reach 0.8 when the manufacturing efficiency per hour is 50-100 cubic centimeters!

The status of semi-finishing and semi-rough turning~www.mtlnovel.com~ In most cases, no further processing is required.

Based on the above three advantages, Xinghai Group's metal 3D additive technology can be said to be a black technology, which is much higher than the world's top level and can be widely used.

Some urgently needed small batch products can be produced by metal 3D additive technology.

All you need is 3D map data.

Of course, this 3D software must have 3D slice function.

It's called slicing, because the metal 3D additive production process is built up layer by layer.

Xinghai Group's AD software, with newly added functions, can support 3D models to printing and molding, and has all the functions of additive manufacturing slicing software.

Moreover, in the lightweight design filling module, lattice hollow patterns such as grids, inner hexagons, cubes, zigzags, intersections, and helical icosahedrons are added, and the number of elements of the selected lattice can be displayed in real time according to the settings. , such as angle, node, volume, porosity, etc. The lattice pattern and parameters can be adjusted independently, no additional design is required, and the design is faster.

That is to say, if someone steals the metal 3D equipment of Xinghai Group, if the AD software does not add Xinghai Group's 3D slice function system, it will be very troublesome to use.

Software and equipment are matched with each other.

It can be said that the manufacturing capacity of Xinghai Group has risen by a big step, resulting in revolutionary changes.

In the future, as long as it is made of metal materials, no matter how complicated the design is, as long as it is within the manufacturing range of the size of the equipment, it can be manufactured.

Since June last year, special steel for core components such as bearings and screw rods has been developed first, followed by servo motors, numerical control systems, etc., before it has really turned to the research and development of metal 3D additive equipment.