Using Big Area Additive Manufacturing to directly manufacture a boat hull mould

Brian K. Post, Phillip C. Chesser, Randall F. Lind, Alex Roschli, Lonnie J. Love, Katherine T. Gaul, Matthew Sallas, Fletcher Blue, Stephen Wu

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

54 Scopus citations

Abstract

Big Area Additive Manufacturing (BAAM) is a large-scale, 3D printing technology developed by Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Manufacturing Demonstration Facility and Cincinnati, Inc. The ability to quickly and cost-effectively manufacture unique moulds and tools is currently one of the most significant applications of BAAM. This work details the application of a BAAM system to fabricate a 10.36 m (34 ft) catamaran boat hull mould. The goal of this project was to explore the feasibility of using BAAM to directly manufacture a mould without the need for thick coatings. The mould was printed in 12 individual sections over a five-day period. After printing, the critical surfaces of the mould were CNC-machined, the sections were assembled, and a final hull was manufactured using the mould. The success of this project illustrates the time and cost savings of BAAM in the fabrication of large moulds.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)123-129
Number of pages7
JournalVirtual and Physical Prototyping
Volume14
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 3 2019

Funding

This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan). This material is based upon work supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Office of Advanced Manufacturing, under contract number DE-AC05-00OR22725. This manuscript has been authored by UT-Battelle, LLC under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 with the U.S. Department of Energy. The United States Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the United States Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this manuscript, or allow others to do so, for United States Government purposes. The Department of Energy will provide public access to these results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan (http://energy.gov/downloads/doe-public-access-plan).

Keywords

  • 3D printing
  • BAAM
  • Big Area Additive Manufacturing
  • Large-scale additive manufacturing
  • boat hull mould
  • tooling

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