JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - EXPERT’S DIGEST - ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING - 2020 - 117

EXPERT'S DIGEST
3D PRINTING

Fig. 2: 3D-printed mandrel produced using ST130TM
material, halving production time and cutting costs
by 20%

Fig. 3: Obsolete air conditioning duct
for historic supercar that needed replacing

Fig. 4: Final air conditioning unit for historic supercar,
featuring 3D-printed air duct produced in Nylon 12CF
and ASA materials

Compositex has always invested significant
resources in enhancing its production
equipment and supporting its R&D (currently averaging 10% of its annual revenue).
This approach has played a key role in
establishing the company as an international
leader in prepreg technology for composite
production. However, faced with the challenge of meeting customers' extremely high
expectations in a more cost- and time-effective way, the company turned to additive
manufacturing in a bid to strengthen its
production capability.

into context, with conventional composite tooling, the creation of four female moulds would
have been required, as well as additional milling
and finishing operations. Not only did we halve
the production time and save around 20% in
costs, but we were also able to fully satisfy the
customer's expectations in terms of the finishing
of the internal side of the duct. "
Beyond the production of composite
tooling, Compositex is also using the Fortus
450mc to directly 3D print customized
composite parts. These include aesthetic
components and structural parts that would
simply be too complex or cost-prohibitive
to produce using conventional methods,
such as the exterior body of remote-controlled aircraft and drones, air ducts for
automotive, and motorcycle handgrips for
motorsport. Having access to this capability
via the Fortus 450mc and high-performance
materials, such as ULTEM™ 9085 resin and
Nylon 12 Carbon Fibre, has been crucial
for the company in expanding its service
offering to meet the needs of this wider and
more diversified customer base.

at Compositex's production site. Those in
charge of the 3D printing department - a
team of four industry specialists - are keen
on embarking on new challenges and testing
unprecedented additive manufacturing
applications for production. Furthermore,
the team is also exploiting the features
of GrabCAD Print software to further
streamline the workflow during design and
development.
" The Fortus 450mc has changed our approach
to business and we fully intend to continue
pushing the boundaries of composite production with this technology, " explains Fanton. " In
fact, when it comes to finding manufacturing
solutions for our customers, we feel the only limit
is our imagination. Unlike other 3D printers
we've tried, the Fortus 450mc is suitable for
the most demanding production applications,
while the level of reliability and repeatability it
provides is essential for occasions where we try
and test unexplored solutions " (Figure 4).

Reinventing traditional composite
production with additive manufacturing
Having explored a number of 3D printing
technologies, Compositex approached
Stratasys' local partner, Technimold, to
purchase a Stratasys Fortus 450mc - an
industrial-grade FDM 3D printer designed
to produce complex parts using high-performance materials. The added capabilities
made an immediate impression, particularly
in the area of composite tooling. The company now 3D prints a range of composite tools,
such as lay-ups, inserts and mandrels - all
key components within the traditional prepreg production process. The ability to manufacture these tools in-house enables them
to eradicate the need for costly outsourcing,
while also significantly reducing production
lead times. Even more importantly, since using Stratasys FDM additive manufacturing
for composite tool production, Compositex
has reported higher-quality results.
" We are currently using the ST130™ material to
3D print water-soluble mandrels and the results
are outstanding, " explains Fanton (Figure 2).
" For example, in order to manufacture a drone
duct for one of our established customers, we
were able to use just one 3D-printed water-soluble mandrel to complete production. To put this

" Stratasys FDM additive manufacturing
ensures we can quickly and cost-effectively
produce certain final parts, which means we
can now respond to customer requests that we
could not fulfill before, " says Fanton. " We were
recently asked to produce an air conditioning
duct for a historic supercar which is no longer in
production. We reverse-engineered the original
duct and then 3D printed the part using carbon
fibre-reinforced Nylon 12CF for the structural
components and ASA material for non-structural elements. The result was exceptional,
far beyond our - and our customer's - initial
expectations. In fact, producing this obsolete
part with traditional manufacturing would
have been impossible " (Figure 3).
Building upon success layer-by-layer
The Fortus 450mc is currently running 24/7

Expert's digest jec

Fanton concludes: " There is no going back.
Working closely together with Stratasys' local
partner, Technimold, we have been able to learn
how to fully streamline and optimize the use
of the technology. Gaining this knowledge and
having local support have been essential in identifying new applications that can be enhanced
with additive manufacturing. We very much see
this technology as an important part of future
production and a key driver for us in attracting
new business opportunities. So much so that we
are currently exploring the purchase of a second
system from Stratasys in the near future. "
More information:
www.stratasys.com

As published in jec composites
magazine N°137 Nov./Dec. 2020

composites magazine Additive Manufacturing

117

http://www.stratasys.com

JEC COMPOSITES MAGAZINE - EXPERT’S DIGEST - ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING - 2020

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