Bernd Klauer
1, Jan Haase
2, Marcel Eckert
1and Dominik Meyer
11 Helmut-Schmidt-Universität, Hamburg, {bernd.klauer | marcel.eckert | dmeyer}@hsu-hh.de
2 Universität zu Lübeck, haase@iti.uni-luebeck.de
Keywords: 3D printing, business opportunities, value chain, plastic printing, concrete printing Kurzfassung. Mit der Entwicklung preiswerter, rechnergestützter, aditiver Druck- und Fertigungsverfahren entsteht gerade eine neue Stufe des Online-Handels. Der produktbasierte Handel hat sich bereits mit der letzten Jahrtausendwende von der Papier-gestützten Struktur (Kataloge, Bestellformulare) in eine breite Palette Internet-basierter Dienste gewandelt. Dabei wird der administrative Teil des Handels elektronisch erledigt, während der Produktwechsel real geschieht.
Die vermehrt lokal verfügbaren 3D-Drucker werden diese Strukturen und Verfahren weiter virtualisieren. Der Transport von Produken wird sich verstärkt in den Bereich der Druck-Rohmaterialien verschieben. Ebenso wird der Umsatz immer weniger durch den Vertrieb von Fertigprodukten generiert werden. Stattdessen werden Lizenzmodelle auf der Basis von Intelligence Properties (IP), die mit den Nutzungsrechten von Software und Medien vergleichbar sind, Marktanteile gewinnen, da der klassische Verbraucher nicht in der Lage sein wird, aufwändige Geometrien zu entwerfen. Der große Vorteil dieses Modells liegt in der passgenauen Fertigung von Geometrien dort, wo sie benötigt werden. Dabei werden Bauteile in der exakt benötigten Menge ohne Verpackungsmaterial, ohne Transportkosten von Stückgütern gefertigt. Verpackung und Transport entstehen nur noch für Rohmaterialien. Damit werden aufwändige und teure Fertigungsstraßen ebenso obsolet. Die Arbeit gibt einen Überblick über aktuell gängige Technologien und deren Auswirkungen auf die Fertigungs- und Wertschöpfungsketten.
Abstract. In the last decades online-shopping became more and more socially acceptable. Inspired from the concepts of catalog-selling the range of online orderable products steadily grew. Nowadays it encompasses not only conventional consumer products like clothing and commodities but also media, luxury articles and even food. Another trend in this direction is the individual online design or configuration of products which will then be fabricated and sent to the customer. The production of unique items has become affordable and lucrative. Examples could be printed t-shirts or photo prints on canvas. The next step will go hand in hand with the growing boom of 3D printers. By use of 3D printing it is not only possible to realize and thereby touch a self-designed workpiece, but new opportunities for industry open up: In the past promotional gifts were handed out at trade fairs, but now a digital blueprint can be sent to potential buyers so they can print the product locally.
Replacement of spare parts such as bolts, nuts, smartphone covers, clamps, etc. is being simplified radically. In particular, packaging and shipping efforts and expenses are removed. Instead, digital blueprints will become subject to a fee and thereby create new sales potentials for manufacturers.
This paper gives an overview on 3D printing techniques and current technical limitations (material, stiffness, duration, durability) as well as future developments of this technology and its impact on manufacturer's chains of distribution.
Introduction
3D Printing is a more and more standard technology to produce any kind of custom part in the place where is needed and just in time when it is needed [1]. With the more and more sophisticated printing techniques the total printing cost is decreasing and design techniques become more and more convenient for users without mathematical or computer science background. Typical applied design flows contain the printing of designs from professionals for free or on a royalty basis. Alternatively,
such designs as far as they are open can be modified to fit into certain geometric environments. Last not least full custom designs can be done if some basic design skills are available.
Printing just in place avoids packaging and shipping with all secondary effects of avoiding waste and energy consumption for shipping. Although common printing techniques rely on plastic 3D printing is an absolute green technology. Together with the environmental advantages producing just in time means that storage cost can also be avoided together (bad for hierarchical sales structures) with product and sales chain cost.
Besides saving money and waste, 3D printing opens up new opportunities to make business. 3D design turns out to be complex for non-experts. Although 3D drawing applications are coming up high sophisticated designs require design experts with year of experience to produce good devices.
Good means in the first row applicable in the sense that the just printed gadget does what it has been designed for. In the second row good also means reliable and durable over a long time. In the third row printed things need to be stylish in a way that people like to see them and to have them in their living or working environment. Experts are also necessary to produce smart designs. Smart in this context means that devices need to be scalable easily by hobby designers or low level users. Smart designs are also easily changeable by non-experts to fit into special geometric surroundings. This means that it should be easy to remove small parts of the geometry, cut notches, drill holes or to add things like hooks, cubes or spheres as needed. Smart designs can easily be improved by simple amendments to give them a perfect applicability.
Money making by royalties or license fees is something common in the area of the design of integrated circuits. So called IP cores can be purchased and merged with self-designed parts of the circuit. IP stands for Intelligence Property. New opportunities will arise here for 3D designs.
An overview on 3D printing technologies and dimensions
Printing technologies are today available to print micron scaled devices as well as for meter scaled objects like buildings. Also the manufacturing materials differ. Very popular for 3D printing are different types of polymers (plastic), metals and concrete [2].
Figure 1: A plastic model of a fan [14]
Polymer technologies. Very popular in medium scaled 3D printing processes used for wearables, toys, houseware, spare parts, model making, and many other areas are plastic technologies. These technologies would not only be needed for generic devices but also for medical fields like dentistry, orthopedics, or prosthetics [3]. The simplest technology works like a hot glue gun. A plastic filament is melted in a heating and extruding device. The extruder is placed by an x/y/z-unit and extruding the plastic. Figure 1 shows a sample from our own plastic printer from the 3000€ pricing segment.
Metal technologies. These technologies would not only be needed for metal devices but also for microsystems such as MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) [4]. Metals with low melting points can be handled similarly to plastic. Metals with high melting points are sintered. A laser beam heats a metal surface. Metal dust is then sprayed over the partly heated surface and adheres at the heated places. Alternatively, the dust is sprayed on the cold surface. A laser beam is then used to heat up the dust and to stick it together with the metal surface.
Concrete printers. Concrete printers become more and more popular to print are used to print whole buildings or parts of buildings to be assembled at the building site. While devices from all other technologies are taken out of the printer to be used, concrete printers are moved to the place where a house needs to be erected. Some printers are so big that they are assembled at the building site like a crane. Most of the concrete printers look like large scale versions of the plastic printers. Some of them are totally different. They consist of crawlers climbing the already done construction to place concrete spots or tubes to erect the whole building. Figure 3 shows parts of a 3D printed house.
Dimensions range of 3D printing. In the above mentioned subsection we have already seen object from hand or finger size dimensions up to building size dimensions. Under investigation are super small micron or nano size technologies. Printing technologies have already been proposed to print such very small parts in [7]. An image of a 3D printed micro scaled Eiffeltower can be seen in Figure 4. The image has been taken from [7].
Figure 2: A metal model of a jet engine [5]
Figure 3: A 3D printing of a house [6]
Figure 4: A micrometer scaled Eiffeltower as shown in [7].
Technological challenges. The most recent challenges in 3D printing are hybrid technologies. This is necessary to print complete gadgets from different technologies within one single printing. This means for example that a house will be printed completely with all electrical wires, all water supply pipes, gas pipes, all floors and floor coverings, windows, frames, doors, the roof, etc. For small scale devices it would be nice to print cases together with all electrical circuits, wires, electrical components, sensors and actuators. For the far future experts are looking forward to having all electronics with all integrated circuits to be printed directly into devices. Space researchers are dreaming of a complete self-reproducing machine. Such a machine would need all technologies to be integrated into the printer to make a print of itself as discussed in [8].
New manufacturing methods. In former times simple parts have mainly been manufactured subtractively. Contours have been cut out of solid bodies by drilling, milling, lathing or sawing. Such subtractive processes have the disadvantage that closed cavities cannot be manufactured and open cavities only with restrictions. To produce more complex things from simple parts additive steps had to follow the primary subtractive phase to put things together adhesively (bonding or soldering), cohesively (weldering) or mechanically by screwing or riveting.
Additive manufacturing like the different 3D printing technologies are the more general manufacturing methods as they are more flexible concerning the space of contours that can be designed and manufactured in one single step. Hybrid 3D printing is currently a focus in academia but will increasingly be available in the next years. This means that complete things containing many different technologies like plastic cases, electronic circuits, sensors, actuators, etc. can directly be printed in one printer without further manufacturing steps.
Conclusions to be drawn
The value chain. The manufacturing chain links will draw closer to the consumer. Today simple printers can be purchased enabling customers to produce their own simple things. The products to be sold are the printers and the filament. The filament is the plastic raw material that will be heated up in the printers heating unit and then extruded thru a nozzle to complete the thing in the printer. This means that the only things not manufactured at home will be the printers and the raw materials in a printer compatible shape. Things can then be printed just in time, just in place and optimized to fit into the place where they are needed and optimized to complete their missions. Product family designs are becoming more and more interesting since only a few changes in a design (or blueprint) lead to new products [10].
Dowels are a simple example to illustrate this. A designer composes the the 3D model of a dowel.
Owners of 3D printers can then print dowels as soon as they need some. Before printing they can scale and optimize their dowels to take the screws and to fit into the holes in a wall. In figure 5 different versions of a 3D model from a dowel can be seen. For the right dowel the model has slightly been modified to produce an individual dowel for a whole which has not been drilled orthogonally into the wall. To order a dowel of this individual type would be prohibitively expensive. The added value of 3D printings is the individual shape of predesigned things, no need to store things at home
Figure 5: Different dowels printed from a parameterized 3D model [14]
for the case of demand, no need for storage space in department stores, no Energy consumption in the supply chains as only raw material (e.g. plastic) needs to be delivered.
The losers. The big disadvantage here is that DIY stores will lose turnover as simple plastic things will soon be printed at home. Many other things will vanish from the stores as people will prefer their own printing instead of buying off-the shelf.
The winners. Home 3D printing needs a lot of expertise in the design phase. Not everybody will be able to create designs. There are two main obstacles in design phase. Good 3D design needs some basic 3D arithmetic in mind. It also needs engineering expertise to create things that stand mechanical stress as well as environmental stress like heat.
Having a proper 3D design does not automatically mean that things can be printed. 3D printers cannot print into large empty spaces. There must be bridges or support structures to enable designs containing long structures without material below.
IP based business models. 3D printing capabilities and demands are a basis for some promising business opportunities. High quality 3D printing requires a huge expertise in the design phase as already mentioned above. As we have already seen in the area of the design of integrated circuits, such models are designed by specialists and sold on a basis of royalties. This leads to the conclusion that sales models which are already common in the IT Hardware, Software and media businesses will extend to 3D printable designs and their descriptions in languages or specific file formats. This means that all IP business models containing a large set of rental and ownership models will be applied on 3D printing. Specialists can make money with selling high quality designs.
Special Printers. As we have seen in the 2D printing domain high quality prints, large scale prints and prints with special printing materials require special printers. As such processes hardly occur in an everyday life at home, 3D print centers are already a growing business comparable to the copy shops in the late 20th century or specialized 2D print centers today. The 3D print centers will offer high quality prints far beyond the quality level of home printers. They will be necessary to produce high quality prints [11] or prints with special materials like metal, concrete or hybrid material compositions. Such printers are too expensive for home printing. As we have observed in the 2D area print shops will come up to provide ‘non-standard’ 3D printing as a service.
Printer rental services. For very large printing projects like houses printed by a concrete printer, building contractor will provide large 3D printers to rent. Such printers will be put in place and operated by the company. The designs must also be done by experts or at least approved by a certified specialist to guarantee that the building will not collapse.
Raw materials. All printing processes need some kind of a raw material (filament) to be processed and put in place by a material specific technology. Instead of delivering things, more and more raw materials with certain mechanical features [12] like elasticity, durability, resistance against certain influences like heat, humidity, impact, etc. will be developed to be processed by a standardized – or different [13] – printing technology. This will also be focus of research and subject to sell.
Outlook
In the future more and more 3D printing services will arise and more and more 3D printers will be installed in offices and private homes. Analogous to paper copiers in the 70s and 80s of the last century the devices are still relatively expensive. But dropping prices will lead to awidespread availability of 3D printers. The next interesting steps to be watched are the development of new possible printing materials, i.e., new items that can be printed. Furthermore, nano printing techniques leading to the creation of printed miniature devices as well as electronics will open up further new markets.
References
[1] M. Sharma, "Betting big on 3D printing," in Engineering & Technology, vol. 11, no. 1, pp.
44-47, February 2016.
[2] Wright, Paul K., 21st Century Manufacturing. Prentice-Hall Inc, 2001, ISBN: 978-0130956019
[3] M. Umair and W. S. Kim, "An Online 3D Printing Portal for General and Medical Fields,"
2015 International Conference on Computational Intelligence and Communication Networks (CICN), Jabalpur, 2015, pp. 278-282.
[4] D. Gendreau, A. Mohand-Ousaid, P. Rougeot and M. Rakotondrabe, "3D-Printing: A promising technology to design three-dimensional microsystems," 2016 International Conference on Manipulation, Automation and Robotics at Small Scales (MARSS), Paris, 2016, pp. 1-5.
[5] http://www.stuttgarter-nachrichten.de/inhalt.maschinenbau-hueftgelenk-aus-dem-drucker.58ba5437-7e6a-4e93-b10c-6a791105d75a.html, July 14, 2016
[6] https://3dprint.com/40455/3d-printed-village-rudenko, July 14, 2016
[7] D. Zheren et al., "3D micro-concrete hybrid structures fabricated by femtosecond laser two-photon polymerization for biomedical and two-photonic applications," 2016 IEEE International Conference on Industrial Technology (ICIT), Taipei, 2016, pp. 1108-1114.
[8] A. Ellery, "Progress towards 3D-printed mechatronic systems," 2016 IEEE International Conference on Industrial Technology (ICIT), Taipei, 2016, pp. 1129-1133.
[9] AEB White Paper: Six theories about how 3D printing will change logistics, 2014, URL:
http://documents.aeb.com/brochures/en/aeb-white-paper-3d-printing.pdf
[10] L. Huiwei, "Research on the Family Design Method of Product by 3D Printing," 2015 Seventh International Conference on Measuring Technology and Mechatronics Automation, Nanchang, 2015, pp. 912-915.
[11] J. Straub, "Automated testing and quality assurance of 3D printing/3D printed hardware:
Assessment for quality assurance and cybersecurity purposes," 2016 IEEE AUTOTESTCON, Anaheim, CA, USA, 2016, pp. 1-5.
[12] F. Decuir, K. Phelan and B. C. Hollins, "Mechanical Strength of 3-D Printed Filaments," 2016 32nd Southern Biomedical Engineering Conference (SBEC), Shreveport, LA, 2016, pp. 47-48.
[13] K. Y. Fok, N. Ganganath, C. T. Cheng and C. K. Tse, "A 3D printing path optimizer based on Christofides algorithm," 2016 IEEE International Conference on Consumer Electronics-Taiwan (ICCE-TW), Nantou, 2016, pp. 1-2.
[14] Image credit: Shown objects and images by Bernd Klauer