______________________________________________________________________________________________________ 3D Printing

uptake of AM / 3DP in healthcare devices , aerospace and automotive industries enabling added value to products in often demanding environments .

However , penetration into the wider manufacturing base has been hampered for several reasons . Firstly , an often-cited panacea for manufacturing technology , the view that ‘ you could build anything ’ was always naïve , and those that bought into that premise were often disappointed . In fact , just as with other more traditional manufacturing technologies , AM / 3DP has its own set of rules and limitations that need to be understood , advanced and implemented through design , manufacturing and post-processing of components that are intended for end use , something that in the Rapid Prototyping days were not really an issue . This requirement to have better understanding of the manufacturing constraints and the lifecycle of components has become one of the harder barriers to overcome and one that has proven costly for those implementing these technologies within their manufacturing operations . However , where the business and technical cases are clear there are numerous examples of success , whether it be for metallic or plastic parts and products .

One of the key drivers for AM / 3DP has been trust , whether this is related to the process reliability and repeatability or in the

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