{"id":2541,"date":"2020-01-22T12:08:46","date_gmt":"2020-01-22T12:08:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/?p=2541"},"modified":"2020-01-22T12:08:46","modified_gmt":"2020-01-22T12:08:46","slug":"the-design-group-at-tedx-part-2-imagine-whats-next-the-future-of-aircraft-manufacturing-is-additive","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/the-design-group-at-tedx-part-2-imagine-whats-next-the-future-of-aircraft-manufacturing-is-additive\/","title":{"rendered":"The Design Group at TEDx &#8211; Part 2: Imagine what\u2019s next\u2026 the future of aircraft manufacturing is additive"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>On 8th November 2019 I participated in TEDx Open University. When I sent off my audition video last summer, I had no idea how much time and effort it would take to develop a 10 minute talk! I applied to speak at TEDx because I was keen to share my research on sustainable manufacturing with a wider audience. With support from the TEDx team, I went through many iterations to refine my ideas, and created a talk focusing on the manufacture of a single aircraft part.\u00a0 \u00a0Participating in TEDx was a great experience, and it was amazing to spend the day with such a wide range of speakers from different disciplines. You can watch the video online or read a transcript of the talk below:<\/p>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"The future of additive manufacturing in aerospace | Helen Lockett | TEDxOpenUniversity\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/pytIqEHUsHU?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><b>Today<\/b><b>,\u00a0<\/b><b>I am going to\u00a0<\/b><b>talk\u00a0<\/b><b>about\u00a0<\/b><b>manufacturing, and\u00a0<\/b><b>how we can<\/b>\u00a0make\u00a0manufacturing more sustainable in the future.\u00a0Some manufacturing processes\u00a0used\u00a0today generate huge amounts of waste and in the\u00a0future\u00a0we will need to use new technologies to make manufacturing more sustainable. I am going to illustrate the challenge by talking about\u00a0just one area of manufacturing\u00a0\u2013 the production\u00a0of\u00a0the large metal structures in aircraft.\u00a0These parts sit under the aircraft skin and give\u00a0the aircraft the strength\u00a0and stiffness\u00a0that is required for flight.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2543\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_309015095.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"418\" height=\"279\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_309015095.jpg 2000w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_309015095-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_309015095-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_309015095-960x640.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 418px) 100vw, 418px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><b>Over the last\u00a0<\/b><b>decade<\/b><b>\u00a0you will have seen many<\/b>\u00a0news headlines about 3D\u00a0printing\u00a0\u2013 do you remember the excitement about a 3D printed\u00a0bicycle\u00a0or the\u00a0court case over\u00a0a 3D printed gun. There was a prediction that we would all have\u00a0a\u00a03D printer in our own home and print out spare parts when we need them.\u00a0The\u00a03D printing market has grown\u00a0rapidly\u00a0and is predicted to be\u00a0worth\u00a0more than\u00a0three\u00a0billion dollars\u00a0next\u00a0year\u00a0[<i>Deloi<\/i><i>t<\/i><i>te<\/i>]. That\u2019s\u00a0a\u00a0pretty\u00a0big\u00a0industry, but where are all the 3D printed\u00a0products?\u00a0Do\u00a0you own\u00a0<i>anything<\/i>\u00a0that is 3D printed?<\/p>\n<p><b>A<\/b><b>dditive manufacturing<\/b>\u00a0is the formal name for 3D printing.\u00a0It gets its name because material is\u00a0<i>added<\/i>\u00a0layer by layer\u00a0to create a shape, as opposed to\u00a0traditional\u00a0manufacturing processes like\u00a0machining that\u00a0are subtractive,\u00a0where\u00a0material is\u00a0<i>removed<\/i>\u00a0from a large block\u00a0to create a shape.\u00a0 You could think of\u00a0additive manufacturing as like creating a sculpture by adding pieces of clay,<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2545\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_1190163964.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"417\" height=\"278\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_1190163964.jpg 2000w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_1190163964-300x200.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_1190163964-768x512.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_1190163964-960x640.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 417px) 100vw, 417px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>whereas\u00a0subtractive\u00a0manufacturing\u00a0is\u00a0more like\u00a0carving\u00a0a sculpture\u00a0from a block of stone.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2544\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_640237309.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"417\" height=\"275\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_640237309.jpg 2000w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_640237309-300x198.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_640237309-768x507.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/shutterstock_640237309-960x634.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 417px) 100vw, 417px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>By adding material\u00a0to create a form, you\u00a0generate less waste\u00a0material, and it gives you\u00a0greater\u00a0design freedom than\u00a0using a\u00a0subtractive\u00a0approach\u2026we\u2019ll come back to that later.\u00a0There are\u00a0many different\u00a0additive manufacturing technologies that can\u00a0build parts\u00a0from\u00a0metals and plastics, ceramics and paper\u00a0and\u00a0even food,\u00a0but today I\u00a0am going\u00a0to focus on metals.<\/p>\n<p><b>You have probably seen<\/b>\u00a0additive manufactured parts like this small ornament\u00a0that have intricate shapes which cannot be produced using conventional manufacturing. They are created by melting layers of fine powder with a laser to build up the part\u00a0layer by layer\u00a0and are being used for many applications including bespoke parts like dental implants and replacement hip joints.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2550\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/small-part.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"416\" height=\"234\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/small-part.jpg 1500w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/small-part-300x169.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/small-part-768x432.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/small-part-960x540.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 416px) 100vw, 416px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>But this type of additive\u00a0manufacturing is too slow and expensive to be scaled up to make larger parts that are required for aircraft structures. I want to show you how a larger, faster additive manufacturing process called wire and arc additive manufacturing, can be used to manufacture large, high value parts more sustainably.\u00a0 This type of additive manufacturing uses an automated welding process controlled by a large robot arm with a welding torch attached to its end. Wire is continuously fed along the robot arm to the welding\u00a0torch, and\u00a0is deposited as a bead of material onto the part. The robot arm follows a digital path to build up the part layer by layer.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2549\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"416\" height=\"197\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam.png 960w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-300x142.png 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-768x364.png 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 416px) 100vw, 416px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><b>So\u00a0<\/b><b>why do we need to adopt<\/b><b>\u00a0<\/b><b>new manufacturing technologies like this one?<\/b>\u00a0I\u2019m going to illustrate the potential by focussing on one part &#8211; a wing rib. This is one of the structural\u00a0parts\u00a0inside an aircraft wing\u00a0that\u00a0helps to carry some of the flight loads and maintain the smooth shape of the wing.\u00a0This part is about 2 metres long and weighs about 20 kg.\u00a0It has a complex shape made up of thin, intersecting walls that are designed to carry the aircraft loads while being as lightweight as possible.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2552\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/wing-rib.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"421\" height=\"206\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/wing-rib.jpg 960w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/wing-rib-300x147.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/wing-rib-768x376.jpg 768w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 421px) 100vw, 421px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><b>Today, this part is manufactured\u00a0<\/b><b>from a single block of aluminium alloy\u00a0<\/b><b>using\u00a0<\/b><b>a type of\u00a0<\/b><b>subtractive manufacturing<\/b><b>\u00a0called machining<\/b>. The aluminium block must be larger in all dimensions than the final part. There are very few suppliers who can produce materials at this size, so\u00a0the block\u00a0needs\u00a0to be ordered many months in advance. In some cases,\u00a0when a new aircraft is designed, the\u00a0block of metal\u00a0must be ordered before the design has been finalised, meaning that an even larger block is ordered to just in case the design changes before it is manufactured, and then the lead time becomes even longer.<\/p>\n<p>The part is manufactured removing\u00a0the unwanted material,\u00a0layer by layer,\u00a0to\u00a0reveal\u00a0the final shape.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0For\u00a0this part, around 95% of the original block of material is machined away, taking many hours and using lots of energy. The waste metal is collected and sold for scrap, but at a much lower price than it was purchased for and is usually recycled to make lower value products like aluminium drinks cans.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2548\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/machines.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1822\" height=\"602\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/machines.png 1822w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/machines-300x99.png 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/machines-768x254.png 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/machines-960x317.png 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1822px) 100vw, 1822px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><b>I want you to really think about how much waste material that is<\/b>. This part is about two metres long and weighs around 20 kilograms\u00a0and the block it is machined from weighs about 500 kg.\u00a0 That means that 480 kg of high\u00a0strength aluminium\u00a0is mined and processed only to be recycled as scrap before it is ever used. If you can\u2019t visualise what 500 kg looks like, it is a bit less than the weight of a small car, and it is used to produce a part that weighs about the same as the driver\u2019s seat. And\u00a0every aircraft has many\u00a010s of similar\u00a0components, some much larger than this one. That\u2019s a lot of scrap metal!<\/p>\n<p><b>So how could this part\u00a0<\/b>might be made more sustainably in the future using\u00a0wire and\u00a0additive manufacturing?\u00a0 This time the starting point is a metal plate that is used as a base to build\u00a0the part\u00a0on. Where possible the part is designed so that\u00a0the plate\u00a0can be incorporated into the final part. The material to build the part is purchased as reels of metal wire that can be kept in stock at the factory, so there is no long lead time like there was for the conventional\u00a0manufacturing\u00a0process.\u00a0Wire and arc additive manufacturing\u00a0is\u00a0used to build up the part layer by layer.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-2547\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/additive.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1819\" height=\"599\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/additive.png 1819w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/additive-300x99.png 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/additive-768x253.png 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/additive-960x316.png 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1819px) 100vw, 1819px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>You can see from the\u00a0example\u00a0here that\u00a0the\u00a0additive manufactured part\u00a0will\u00a0have\u00a0a\u00a0slightly wavy\u00a0surface and still needs to be machined to create the final part. But unlike the\u00a0conventional\u00a0manufacturing approach, only a small\u00a0layer\u00a0of metal needs to be removed in the machining operation, generating much less waste material.\u00a0 And because there is less material to process, the combined additive and subtractive process is faster than conventional machining and the energy cost is lower.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone wp-image-2554\" src=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-part.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"416\" height=\"274\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-part.jpg 1742w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-part-300x198.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-part-768x506.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/01\/waam-part-960x632.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 416px) 100vw, 416px\" \/><\/p>\n<p><b>You can see\u00a0<\/b><b>from this example\u00a0<\/b><b>that the additive manufacturing<\/b>\u00a0process is more efficient, reducing waste\u00a0material and lead time. It has the\u00a0potential to save many tonnes of scrap metal for every aircraft that is manufactured, and there are many hundreds of aircraft manufactured every year.\u00a0<b>But th<\/b><b>ere are other benefits too\u2026\u00a0<\/b><\/p>\n<p>Additive\u00a0manufacturing\u00a0can\u00a0produce\u00a0parts with\u00a0optimised\u00a0shapes that are\u00a0lighter\u00a0than conventional parts, reducing the overall weight of the aircraft. And for every kilogramme of weight that is saved on the aircraft, the emissions are\u00a0a little\u00a0lower for every flight too.<\/p>\n<p>And\u00a0even better,\u00a0when parts\u00a0need to be repaired, additive manufacturing can be used to\u00a0rebuild the damaged area,\u00a0extending the life of\u00a0the\u00a0parts.<\/p>\n<p><b>So<\/b><b>, back to the hype about 3D printing<\/b>.\u00a0\u00a0You\u00a0may not\u00a0yet\u00a0own\u00a0any 3D printed products, or\u00a0have a\u00a03D printer in\u00a0your own\u00a0home, but\u00a0in the\u00a0future\u00a0there\u00a0<i>will<\/i>\u00a0be 3D printed parts in\u00a0the products\u00a0we\u00a0use. They\u00a0will\u00a0be\u00a0in\u00a0the\u00a0aircraft\u00a0we fly in,\u00a0the\u00a0cars\u00a0we drive,\u00a0and\u00a0even\u00a0in\u00a0our bodies,\u00a0helping\u00a0to\u00a0make manufacturing more sustainable\u00a0in the future.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>On 8th November 2019 I participated in TEDx Open University. When I sent off my audition video last summer, I had no idea how much time and effort it would take to develop a 10 minute talk! I applied to speak at TEDx because I was keen to share my research on sustainable manufacturing with [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":2556,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[37],"tags":[167,54],"class_list":["post-2541","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-design-comment","tag-additive-manufacturing","tag-engineering-design"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2541","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2541"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2541\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2562,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2541\/revisions\/2562"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2541"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2541"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.open.ac.uk\/blogs\/design\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2541"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}