Military machines, weapons and vehicles are usually restored and used over a long period of time in their fleet. To keep them working smoothly maintenance department is highly dependent on inventory supply and management. Supply of old model equipment spare parts are difficult due to many reasons such as:
- Large number of inventories
- Too old manufactured parts hence no traceability of supplier/manufacturer
- Drawings not available
- Material details not available
- Manufacturing discontinued by original manufacturer
- Long lead time to get spare from OEM after ordering (in conventional machining)
Outsourcing of parts have been an old solution for many years to procure these parts. Thousands of replacement parts and tools are required and sourced from external companies adding to extra costs of spare parts stock. Additive manufacturing here becomes a viable option for defence industry to manufacture tools and parts on demand.
Additive manufacturing (AM), popularly known as 3-D printing, is a revolutionary technology that is emerging as an alternative to traditional manufacturing sector in competitive manner. It was first introduced to create prototypes for the manufacturing sector.Globally, additive manufacturing has been found to be a pathbreaking technology that can greatly transform the defence industry’s operations, maintenance and its capabilities.
Various solutions additive manufacturing technology offers for the spare parts management are explained in brief:
- Reverse engineering technology:
Fig.1 Reverse engineering
Reverse engineering technology in the field of 3D printing is a boon to defence industry. The old obsolete parts whose design files, drawings are not in records, can be digitized by 3D scanning. The scanned parts can be saved in appropriate cad formats suitable for manufacturing. The military machinery is usually imported from other countries, so importing original spare parts will be expensive and time consuming. The reverse engineering enables on the spot manufacturing of spare by using the digitized cad file for printing.
- Virtual stocking
Stocking up of spare parts can cost a fortune as it will take up space in warehouse, as well as its manufacturing can cost an ample amount of budget with parts being stocked without the knowledge of the quantity actually required. A reverse engineered design file can be virtually saved on a secured server and can be accessed anytime, when the spare part is actually required. This enables production on demand of spare part without investing in ware house and spare large number of parts.
- Design improvements:
The older spare designs are according to conventional and then available manufacturing capabilities. The digitised cad files can be used for design modifications of spare parts with the objective of light weighing, reducing the number of components by part consolidating, material saving, etc. The additive manufacturing is capable to produce complex parts, with light weight and efficient performance.
Fig.2 Optimised design of component
- Quick Manufacturing
Additive manufacturing significantly speeds up the process since it requires no tooling. As compared to traditional methods of manufacturing which can take months to produce the spare parts because of required tooling for machining. The defence industry can take a benefit of this technology to ramp up the manufacturing of spare parts by bypassing the time-consuming tooling.A 3D printed spare part can be manufactured in lesser time and better quality by using the optimised design.
- Materials:
Additive manufacturing supports with every different alloy that can perform efficiently in its service in defence. The traditional manufactured old spares which don’t have the material traceability, can be checked for its composition and studied to select best additive manufacturing alternative material for it. The AM material library can definitely help defence equipment to perform efficient than before.
- Indigenisation of part
Indigenisation of components is now a need to become a self-reliant country. With this sudden declaration of drives, it becomes very challenging to manufacture spares in India with conventional machining in less time. By using quick solutions of AM for inventory management, defence industry can save itsvaluable time and resources to support this drive and without disturbing its operations. By using the 3D printer service providers in India eliminates out sourcing of manufacturing to foreign countries and saves logistics time and custom and other charges. This will also keep the data secured within the country.
Conclusion
Additive manufacturing (AM) can transform the defence industry supply chain management to a greater extent. The advantages of additive manufacturing of spare parts will turn out as a boon for defence industry. Incredible AM Pvt. Ltd. is a leading company in manufacturing high quality and complex 3D printed parts.This bureau provides all the solutions required for inventory management. With the experts in design, manufacturing knowledge and researchit has world class infrastructure that is capable to produce every required part in best quality.
