Aidro Hydraulics Logos JIP parteners
A group of 20 companies have developed qualification guidelines for additively manufactured parts in the oil & gas and maritime industries.
Encompassing 3D printing vendors like Additive Industries and SLM Solutions, metal powder companies like Sandvik and voestalpine, parts suppliers like Aidro Hydraulics and Ivaldi Group and oil & gas giants like Shell and BP, the joint innovation project (JIP) has aimed to represent the complete value chain.
Pooling their respective expertise, the group set out two programmes which focused on a guideline to certify 3D printed components (managed by DNV-GL) and a ‘toolbox’ for part selection, supply chain set-up and economic viability (managed by Berenschot). These projects were closely aligned to ensure maximum knowledge exchange and learning between the members.
The certification guideline includes a quality assurance methodology which divides additively manufactured parts into three separate categories. Class 1 is intended for non-critical components, Class 2 for less critical components and Class 3 for critical components. Depending on the class of the part and the additive process used, it will be put through different assurance steps, such as build process qualification testing, production testing and part qualification testing.
All parts are to be be manufactured using a build process qualified through a defined Build Process Qualification Testing (BPQT) procedure to ensure a baseline quality is achieved. Production testing is intended to ensure repeatability of this process so the tenth, hundredth and thousandth print are the same quality as the first, while part qualification testing depends on the Class the components falls into.
Aidro Hydraulics
case study - crank disk made by Aidro
Kongsberg crank disk ring additively manufactured by Aidro Hydraulics with Direct Metal Laser Sintering technology.
In order to develop the guidelines and business impact model in tune with ‘realistic manufacturing practices’, the partners additively manufactured several components with powder bed fusion and wire arc additive manufacturing equipment under conditions resembling real life situations. This allowed the companies to understand the variations between traditional techniques and additive ones in the production step as well as the entire workflow.
With wire arc technology, a BP cross-over in Inconel wire was printed in two versions, as was a Vallourec circulating head using X90 low-alloy construction steel. Powder bed fusion technology was leveraged to produce Equinor impellers in Inconel 625 and Ti-6A1-4V, a Kongsberg propeller blade in titanium and a Kongsberg crank disk ring in Inconel 718. This last component was manufactured with an EOS M290 platform by Aidro Hydraulics in one week, compared to the eight weeks it would take through conventional means. The partners believe it to be a suitable example of how additive manufacturing can be used in place of traditional methods in heavy industries.
A full break down of the collaborators follows:
Operators:
- BP
- Equinor
- Shell
- Total
Contractors:
- Kongsberg
- IMI Critical Engineering
- Siemens
- SLM Solutions
- TechnipFMC
Fabricators:
- Additive Industries
- Aidro Hydraulics
- ArcelorMittal
- HIPtec
- IMMENSA Technology Labs
- Ivaldi
- Quintus
- Sandvik
- University of Strathclyde Glasgow
- Vallourec
- Voestalpine
