Designing parts for 3D printing
Additive manufacturing is increasingly used in product design and product manufacturing. For adoption of 3D printing to continue to increase several aspects need to develop in parallel. Obviously the cost of materials and machines needs to come down and the processes themselves need to develop further and improve. Designers also need to understand how to design parts for additive manufacturing. Design for additive manufacturing (DfAM) is as important as anything else for increasing adoption. Unless designers understand the opportunities and constraints of the processes and materials then the parts they design will never take full advantage of the freedom and capabilities on offer. There are three approaches to design parts and products for 3D printing ; Replicate - here you just take the old part and print it via an additive manufacturing process without any or minimal changes to the part design. This is generally the least effective way of incorporating additive manufacturing