Sintavia develops proprietary copper 3D printing process.
Sintavia has announced the development of a proprietary process for 3D printing with a copper alloy commonly used by the likes of NASA and other space flight companies for the manufacture of rocket thrust chamber assemblies.
The announcement marks the first publicly disclosed material development for the Florida-based company, which specialises in supplying additively manufactured parts to the aerospace industry. The breakthrough, developed on an EOS M400-4 four-laser 3D printer, is a combination of GRCop-42 material along with a proprietary parameter set and heat treatment process. Sintavia says this unique combination results in GRCop-42 parts which feature a minimum density of 99.94%, minimum tensile strength of 28.3 ksi, minimum ultimate yield strength of 52.7 ksi and minimum elongation of 32.4%. The end to end process is also said to eliminate the need for a hot isostatic press which in turn reduces lead time and cost of production.
Pavlo Earle, Sintavia’s Vice President of Engineering, commented: “As a company, we are uniquely positioned to unlock the potential of printing difficult materials cost-effectively and with excellent mechanical properties. The fact that we were able to achieve these levels of performance on GRCop-42—by all indications a very difficult metal for additive manufacturing—further cements Sintavia’s role as the global leader in the application of AM within the aerospace, defense, and space industry.”
Sintavia has been steadily growing its AM capacity with a huge fleet of machines including eight M400-4 printers and several others from GE Additive, TRUMPF and EOS’s AMCM business, the latter of which are being installed this summer to deliver large-scale thrust chamber assemblies in a single build. While today’s announcement provides a glimpse into Sintavia’s ongoing materials developments, the company said that it is also currently developing proprietary standards for other materials, including refractory alloys, for use in aerospace, defense and space applications.
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