A COLLABORATIVE INNOVATE UK PROJECT LEAD BY RIVELIN ROBOTICS WORKING WITH KEY PARTNERS ATTENBOROUGH MEDICAL, GKN AEROSPACE & MATERIALS SOLUTIONS
Because the lead companion of an Innovate UK funded mission Rivelin Robotics is working to ship an entire digital publish processing answer for the automated ending of flight components, orthopaedic implants and fuel turbine parts produced utilizing metallic additive manufacturing (AM) processes. Designated Undertaking CAMPFIRE (Licensed Additive Manufactured Components Completed with Clever Robotics Engine), Rivelin is collaborating with 5 companions. Three are particular to publish processing purposes for regulated industries utilizing metallic AM, particularly Attenborough Medical, GKN Aerospace and Supplies Options (a Siemens Vitality Enterprise). Two additional companions are supporting with the supply of key {hardware} applied sciences, particularly YASKAWA EU and Saint-Gobain Abrasives.
Right here the purpose is to offer an summary of the mission along with perception into every of the companions, together with their motivation and their targets, along with some early perception into the progress that’s being made.
Beginning with the Undertaking Leaders, Rivelin Robotics was based to instantly tackle the challenges of publish processing metallic AM components. Born of painful expertise as an engineer tasked with eradicating metallic helps from AM components and reaching varied ranges of floor end, Rivelin’s CEO ¬— Robert Bush — established the corporate to develop an actual and repeatable answer to the issues he confronted, realizing that he was not alone.
The challenges with publish processing metallic components are many, not least the labour-intensive, time-consuming, filthy and generally harmful actions concerned in eradicating metallic helps with hand instruments. Consider it or not, this method is the prevailing commonplace for publish processing most metallic components after they come off an AM system. Furthermore, there are further operational issues of this guide method that additionally pose challenges resembling repeatability, high quality management, lengthy lead instances and excessive prices. These issues are elementary, certainly crucial, for regulated industries which have to stick to stringent requirements of compliance.
Because it was based in 2018, the Rivelin crew developed and commercialised an answer — delivered to the market within the type of its Netshape Robots — that may present actually autonomous publish processing capabilities. The Rivelin *magic* comes by its Netshape software program and the corporate works with {hardware} companions to ship an entire answer. Furthermore, since arriving available on the market, the response to the Rivelin Netshape robots has been phenomenal with curiosity for any such answer in excessive demand, not least from corporations which can be utilising metallic AM processes for manufacturing purposes at growing scale.
Three such corporations, from three totally different regulated industries have been eager to work with Rivelin to check and implement the NetShape robots for their very own purposes. Undertaking CAMPFIRE is offering a artistic and collaborative approach for this to maneuver ahead. Attenborough, GKN and Supplies Options are all corporations which were coping with the challenges of publish processing metallic AM components for a few years. Recognised as leaders of their respective fields these corporations have adopted metallic AM processes to harness the various advantages of the know-how for the manufacturing of finish use metallic AM components of their respective industries. Whereas the components — and the appliance of them — are very totally different in specification, there are lots of components that unite these corporations, not least their frustrations with the standard choices out there to them for publish processing their components.
GKN Aerospace
GKN Aerospace is a world main Tier 1 provider to the aerospace industries, with clients together with Airbus, Rolls Royce and GE. GKN Aerospace has been maturing metallic AM for over a decade working to develop and exploit the know-how on each civil and navy aerospace programmes, and has achieved a lot of milestones on this course of. Serial manufacturing of eBeam powder mattress fusion (PBF) know-how on a Navy software has been achieved, with flying demonstration of Laser-PBF parts, alongside EASA certification of L-PBF topology optimised brackets for a Enterprise Jet Buyer additionally being completed. GKN’s present focus is to utilise its additive fabrication know-how to supply dependable and sustainable prepared to make use of options to castings and forgings inside its engines enterprise. GKN has its AM centre of excellence inside its Bristol primarily based International Know-how Centre, the place it homes a spread of AM machines, ancillary tools and a crew of over 15+ analysis engineers and materials scientists. GKN has engaged in Innovate UK Supported R&D initiatives ATI DAM & ATI Horizon lately, working efficiently with the broader UK eco-system to drive the event of UK extensive AM capabilities.
Undertaking CAMPFIRE extends this experience additional down the AM course of chain. The publish processing section stays a barrier on a lot of fronts, particularly productiveness and dependable high quality assurance for larger volumes of components. Brad Hughes, Principal Analysis Engineer – Additive Manufacturing at GKN Aerospace, commenting on the collaboration with Undertaking CAMPFIRE: “Powder Mattress Additive Manufacturing is a core a part of GKN Aerospace’s long-term technique, as we glance to diversify our materials provide chain, enabling us to develop our enterprise and higher serve our clients. While AM has the potential to ship a number of advantages in aerospace, from product efficiency to sustainability enhancements, there are clear limitations to its adoption. Presently AM merchandise are mostly completed through guide operations, with assist materials eliminated by hand in labour intensive processes inflicting bottlenecks in our manufacturing processes. Handbook assist removing is usually not correct sufficient and never repeatable, various extensively from technician to technician. In some circumstances, the assist removing course of can lead to half defects, with non-conforming components due to this fact needing rework, or generally even an entire rebuild. With the continued industrialisation of Additive Manufacturing which means extra components being produced 12 months on 12 months, it’s difficult to scale guide assist removing into a top quality assured economical course of. By means of the CAMPFIRE programme GKN Aerospace are collaborating with Rivelin Robotics to discover using robotic techniques to automate the method of eradicating assist materials from advanced Aerospace merchandise. The Rivelin know-how provides many engaging options to aerospace finish customers: the chance to take away human interactions, enhance repeatability and productiveness. Working with Rivelin we are going to assess the efficiency of their present system on website at GKN Aerospace’s International Know-how Centre in Bristol UK, and thru suggestions we are going to specify upgrades and modifications that may be included into future techniques. This may make sure the know-how has a path to scalable adoption within the aerospace sector, assembly the wants of end-users. The upgrades can be validated by the consortium, by a joint know-how demonstrator enabling us to quantify the advantages of the know-how in opposition to the rudimentary guide removing strategies.”
Supplies Options
At Supplies Options (a Siemens Vitality enterprise), the mission is to empower clients to fulfill the rising world demand for vitality whereas transitioning to a extra sustainable world. Supplies Options has been pioneering using metallic AM within the UK and globally for over a decade, to assist obtain that mission. The corporate’s manufacturing facility in Worcester is a state-of-the-art digital manufacturing facility with different related services in Germany, Sweden and the USA.
The usage of metallic AM as a manufacturing technique for industrial fuel turbine parts is growing quickly, in response to Trevor Illston, Chief Manufacturing Engineer at Supplies Options. He commented: “The main benefit of utilizing AM is the flexibility to fabricate extremely advanced, optimised geometries that may enhance the efficiency of the fuel generators. A great instance of that is for stage 1 turbine vanes the place the flexibility to design and manufacture extremely advanced inside cooling schemes has enabled vanes to be launched with enhanced operational life, together with a major discount in cooling air necessities and allowed using extra value aggressive turbine alloys.”
Illston and his crew are on the slicing fringe of industrialising metallic AM. They’ve a print course of that may be very a lot standardised, licensed and optimised, whereby the main focus has shifted to streamlining and digitising Supplies Options’ wider manufacturing operations, which incorporates the publish processing of components as a precedence. Illston explains: “The present assist removing technique that we make use of entails a posh course of chain utilising EDM to take away the majority of the assist from the forefront adopted by guide assist removing utilizing pneumatic instruments and guide floor dressing. A rework loop is commonly required to make sure that the floor profile tolerance and floor high quality required is achieved for the ultimate parts. That is each time consuming and never significantly environment friendly – it has lengthy been the main bottleneck within the total AM course of. The goal of our involvement in Undertaking CAMPFIRE is to utilise the Rivelin Netshape Robotic to scale back the variety of operations within the course of chain and display an enchancment within the vane vanguard high quality to routinely meet the necessities with none further rework on the floor to extend productiveness.”
One other key purpose of the mission for Supplies Options is reaching certification for vitality components inside demanding necessities of the vitality sector.
Attenborough Dental and Medical
Based in 1913, Attenborough Medical is a frontrunner within the UK medical manufacturing sector. In the present day, the corporate provides knowledgeable capabilities in 3D medical imaging, scanning and customized implant design & manufacture with ISO13485:2016, ISO9001:2015, DAMAS and IIP Accredition. A part of the identical group, Attenborough Dental is a producer of bespoke biomedical implants and has grown to turn into considered one of Europe’s largest dental laboratories, exporting the world over. As such the corporate is registered with The Medicines and Healthcare merchandise Regulatory Company. The Attenborough dental enterprise based the UK’s first digital manufacturing centre in April 2000 and operates a full suite of manufacturing tools together with 22 one tonne milling machines, 10 massive format 3D printers and two SLM laser sintering machines serving UK, Europe and the Center East with over 260 satellite tv for pc scanning centres.
Ed Attenborough is the corporate’s CEO and a vocal proponent of metallic AM for the manufacturing of components. “Utilizing metallic AM for the manufacturing of affected person particular implants in dental and medical discipline will not be new, we have been researching and subsequently doing it for years. There are lots of benefits for utilizing AM to fabricate the implants. Affected person particular implant units are all distinctive to the affected person, and each is specifically design primarily based on the affected person’s particular person anatomy and scientific requirement. AM allows any such personalisation and mass customisation of advanced implants in addition to diminished materials waste and freedom of design. Thus, utilizing AM for manufacturing the person implants is the best choice for us.”
Nevertheless, he isn’t reticent about confronting the problems the corporate faces with the publish processing of metallic components: “The publish processing section of metallic AM implants is a significant bottleneck in our total course of. As our enterprise has grown and volumes proceed to extend, discovering an answer to overcoming this bottleneck is crucial. Aside from the time it takes for every half with growing volumes, different challenges embody the truth that totally different medical implant sizes can range and the components themselves are usually small, delicate and fragile. It isn’t unusual for components to interrupt throughout assist removing or warp as a result of exterior forces utilized to the half through the guide removing course of. This impacts each our total productiveness and consistency and these are the problems we need to resolve. Being a part of Undertaking CAMPFIRE is a no brainer and doubtlessly a game-changer for us. We working collaboratively inside this mission as a result of we want a full digital publish processing answer.”
Rivelin Robotics has developed and provides the revolutionary digital capabilities for this answer, however the full bundle additionally requires superior {hardware}. Whereas Rivelin’s Netshape capabilities are {hardware} agnostic, the corporate has partnered with superior {hardware} suppliers for Undertaking Campfire that allow the total answer to be delivered. YASKAWA EU As a world-leading industrial drives and robotic arm producer YASKAWA is a key companion for Rivelin and may carry system integration capabilities to the collaboration. By means of its European robotic manufacturing and system answer capabilities YASKAWA is delivering robotic and positioner cell options on to Rivelin. This enables Rivelin to give attention to the combination and implementation of their state-of-the-art sensors and processes to carry dexterity, versatility, and ease of operation as an entire buyer centered answer for his or her clients. These are the capabilities which can be being deployed for Undertaking CAMPFIRE.
Jonny Gray, Gross sales Director at YASKAWA UK stated: “Yaskawa is keen about pushing the advantages of robotic automation to producers. By means of Rivelin, we see the potential for robotic publish processing of AM components to be more and more adopted throughout many industries, even these which can be extremely regulated. YASKAWA has the robotic merchandise and manufacturing capabilities wanted to assist these options as demonstrated by the cross-collaboration of Undertaking CAMPFIRE. It is an thrilling partnership and one which presents YASKAWA with a singular worth technology alternative leveraging each our robotic merchandise and operational strengths.”
Saint Gobain Abrasives
In the same approach, Saint-Gobain has greater than 100 years of expertise as a world chief in grinding know-how and gear options. These options have been used for numerous purposes together with the guide ending of metallic components. Now, nonetheless, the corporate is totally conscious of the transition to automation and the industrial potential that it provides.
Gabriele De Blasio is Robotics Supervisor for Abrasive Purposes EMEA and is the one who can advise on the fitting abrasive, burr and bit for the ending job. While the robotic and instruments get all the eye, his toolbits are the unsung heroes of profitable post-processing whether or not automated or in any other case. Nevertheless, he commented on the corporate’s involvement in Undertaking CAMPFIRE: “Automation is completely the important thing for publish processing. We have now a number of clients worldwide working within the discipline of turbine blades processing, and historically all of these have been completed manually. That is altering now and we’re excited to be concerned on this mission as we witness the transition to totally automated publish processing.”
As Undertaking CAMPFIRE strikes ahead with all companions totally engaged in working in direction of profitable outcomes for his or her respective industrial purposes, Robert Bush, CEO of Rivelin Robotics is worked up by the progress that’s being made: “Main Undertaking CAMPFIRE is a major milestone for Rivelin Robotics. Whereas we’ve got been delivering and putting in Netshape Robots to key clients since final 12 months, this mission is an excellent solution to display the capabilities of Netshape throughout industries and purposes. Customers of metallic AM for manufacturing are unanimous of their demand for an automatic answer for assist removing and ending. Whatever the components and the way or the place they are going to be used, the shared ache in getting these components from the AM machine to the purpose of use is prevalent and engenders collaboration to unravel the problems. That is precisely what Undertaking CAMPFIRE goals to do and within the coming weeks and months we look ahead to sharing deeper insights and key outcomes.”