3D printing or additive manufacturing is a process of producing physical object directly from CAD file. This is a material addition process and so no or minimal material is wasted during the production of parts. The object is created by laying layer over layer until complete object is printed.
As 3D printing becoming one of the mainstream processes in Electric vehicle manufacturing as well. Design verification and validation process can be fast tracked and completed with lower costs, providing opportunity to the engineers for early detection of issues and rectification before start of mass production. These benefits enable EV to grow more and make products more affordable to ordinary people and allow the planet to have a more sustainable and green future. This will certainly provide more sustainability and safe manufacturing option to OEMs.
Currently, limited types of metal and plastics can be 3D printed, however with further evolution more and more materials are getting added day by day.
Few of the reasons why and how 3D printing is used in Electric vehicle manufacturing are as mentioned below.
Producing complete Car Shell: With evolution of 3D printers, today even complete life-sized car 3D printing is possible. This saves time as well as cost for the production. Prototype manufacturing of first car for testing is costly affair due to limited volumes and part development tooling cost. 3D printing resolved this problem and made it more flexible and feasible to print entire car body with the technique. The costs are reduced here due to no need for inventory, tooling, or assembly lines. The technology also ensures the car is lightweight. No joining needed for production and hence reduces overall weight.
Ease in product Customisation: Electrical vehicle customisation as per customer need is one of the biggest reasons for adopting 3D printing technology for EV manufacturing. With no tooling requirement and Fast track production, 3D printing makes it easy for manufacturers to produce variant of electric vehicles at low cost.
Printed AC ducts: Making AC dusts by traditional technique needs large tooling and costly until performance is proven and evaluated. So printing AC ducts using 3D techniques, provides ease of performance testing for AC and also even in real life production, ducts can be continued as 3D printed without any tooling.
Heat Resistant Battery Fixtures: In this continued development of Electric vehicles, battery pack sizes changes and this calls for change in battery fixtures. Every time changing fixture needs new tooling. Thanks to 3D printing technology with which OEMs can make change in design without many efforts.
Manufacturing tools: Setting up process and new type of manufacturing tooling is equally time consuming and costly for Electrical vehicle manufacturers. This all can be reduced by using 3D printing technology for producing tooling.
Design flexibility for Complex parts production: 3D printing provided unlimited flexibility to design engineers to produce Complex design part without many efforts. This technique can be used for prototype parts but not limited too, as can continue for production of saleable vehicle parts. Design changes can be adapted and implemented in real time.
Moulds for casting parts: Moulds of Casting parts production can be made using 3D printing and this saves lot of time and cost.
Conclusion:
With everyday innovation, 3D printing technology is opening new doors for electric vehicle manufacturers. With such vast applications, 3D printing is not only cost and time saving but also make our production process more sustainable and greener for environment. This also make safe working for labour.
Incredible AM Pvt. Ltd has been one of the pioneers in India for metal 3D printing with our state-of-the-art plant in Pune, India. Incredible is a one-stop solution for all 3d printing requirements having in house facilities for Concept/idea, Preproduction, Designing, and 3D Printing.
