Near Net Shape Rapid Manufacture & Repair by LENS(registered trademark)
Abstract
Components and systems manufactured from advanced materials such as titanium alloys, superalloys or special steels are critical to the performance of the armed forces. However, utilising performance materials presents several challenges. By their very nature, they are difficult, costly and time consuming to process. The main manufacturing routes of casting, forging and machining typically exhibit long lead times, extreme Buy-to-Use ratios and, being tool based, inherently inflexible. This seriously impacts on systems affordability and development times. Defence manufacturing is low volume with production runs being typically limited to a maximum of several thousand parts. In some cases, a series of prototype parts, constantly evolving in design need to be manufactured. Production runs of many components may be less than ten or twenty units before they are updated. In the case of re-manufacturing legacy parts single components may be required. Consequently, high set up and tooling costs are therefore only amortised over a small number of components, driving up procurement cost. During operation components produced from advanced materials operate in severe environments and suffer from rapid wear and damage. Quite often, existing repair procedures cannot cope with these difficult to work materials. The only alternative replacement at high cost, driving up total life cycle costs and draining military budgets and natural resources. As an example of the scale of this problem, the US Military's maintenance operations support more than 500 ships, 16,000 aircraft, 50,000 ground vehicles, and other military assets at a cost of greater than $40 billion annually. The high cost of maintenance puts a severe drain on military budgets. With defence departments now looking to extend systems lifetimes beyond the original designed lifetime, the need for effective repair techniques is becoming increasingly important.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- May 01, 2006
- Accession Number
- ADA524690
Entities
People
- Martin Hedges
- Neil Calder