Abstract
Additive manufacturing is one of the nine technologies fuelling the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0). High power lasers augmented with allied digital technologies is changing the entire manufacturing scenario through metal additive manufacturing by providing feature-based design and manufacturing with the technology called laser additive manufacturing (LAM). It enables the fabrication of customized components having complex and lightweight designs with high performance in a short period. The chapter compiles the evolution and global status of LAM technology highlighting its advantages and freedoms for various industrial applications. It discusses how LAM is contributing to Industry 4.0 for the fabrication of customized engineering and prosthetic components through case studies. It compiles research, development, and deployment scenarios of this new technology in developing economies along with the future scope of the technology.
TopIntroduction
Industrial revolution witnesses a marked era, where innovations or inventions change the way products and services are produced for faster delivery with increased profitability at a lower cost. The first (1760-1840), second (1870-1914) and third (1969 onwards) industrial revolutions are characterized by massive changes in industrial operations mainly due to the introduction of innovations in the steam engine, electricity and automation, respectively (Horn, Rosenband, & Smith, 2010), (Reisman, 1996), (Engelman, 2020), (Meak, 2020)]. These three industrial revolutions were centred on mass production for increasing profits and the market was extraordinarily driven by sellers. Subsequently, the market took a U-turn and shifted from sellers' driven market to buyers' market. It pushed industries to adopt the policy of supplying the best quality products and services at the lowest possible price immediately meeting all possible consumer's expectations. Industries coming with more innovations and better after-sales support started dominating the market. The trend is evident nowadays too; it is recognized as the commencement of the fourth industrial revolution or Industry 4.0. In this period, industries are toiling to bring “first product in the market” and there was not much market share for “me-too-products” (a product that is designed with same design philosophy/ feature as another existing product in the market) in this unending race. In this way, the period of mass production is translating into mass customization with a fine balance between customer satisfaction and mass production. It is expected that autonomous there will be a breakthrough in the field of robotics, nanotechnology, quantum computing, internet of things, biotechnology, artificial intelligence (AI), autonomous vehicles and additive manufacturing (AM) (Quintanilla, Hope, Darnton, & Hunter, 2019). As per literature, nine different sectors are recognized as pillars of Industry 4.0 (Cheng, Liu, Qiang, & Liu, 2016) (Vaidya, Ambad, & Bhosle, 2018):
Key Terms in this Chapter
Powder Bed Fusion: An additive manufacturing process in which thermal energy selectively fuses regions of a powder bed.
Industry 4.0: A name for the current trend of automation and data exchange in manufacturing technologies, including cyber-physical systems, the Internet of things, cloud computing and cognitive computing and creating the smart factory.
Directed Energy Deposition: An additive manufacturing process in which focused thermal energy is used to fuse materials by melting as they are being deposited.
Mass Customization: Mass customization is a marketing and manufacturing technique which combines the flexibility and personalization of custom-made products with the low unit costs associated with mass production.
LASER: A laser is a device that emits light through a process of optical amplification based on the stimulated emission of electromagnetic radiation.
Additive Manufacturing: A process of joining materials to make objects from 3D model data, usually layer upon layer, as opposed to subtractive and formative manufacturing methodologies.