Today@Dal

From the June 18 Chronicle Herald:

There’s a reason it’s called disruptive technology.

3D metal printing is turning mechanical design and manufacturing upside down, says Abid Ahmad.

“It is a game changer,” said Ahmad, the academic chair of mechanical and industrial technologies at Nova Scotia Community College’s Waterfront Campus in Dartmouth.

“We have to retrain our brains to think of engineering design in a very different way.”

The college, which already had a ceramic and plastic 3D printer, got a 3D metal printer in January. It uses metal powders, advanced software and laser technology to create functional metal parts that can be used by the aerospace, shipbuilding and biomedical industries.

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Stephen Corbin, a professor of materials engineering at Dalhousie University in Halifax, and his research students are collaborating with the college and industries to find the best processes for 3D metal printing.

“Once you build the part from the powders, we would examine the part and look at its structure, the microstructure, and how that is determined by the process — for example, how it might be determined by the laser power that you use or how fast the laser is moving,” Corbin said Wednesday.

“You might need a certain strength or a certain corrosion resistance or a certain hardness, and that is all related to the structure.”

Many large companies in the aerospace and medical industries are adopting 3D metal technology, he said.

Read the rest of this article at the Chronicle Herald's website.