Another superb article by WeaponsMan:
“WeaponsMan,” we can hear you thinking. “Dey already done dat.” Well,
not exactly. Sure, they printed a gun before, but this time they did
something pretty amazing: they printed all 34 non-spring parts in a
single go (see the photo of the parts below, fresh from the
laser-sintering machine with only the unused powder removed yet). And
they printed it of Inconel 625, which you’ve probably never used in a
gun before (but if you’ve ever flown in a jet airplane, it was probably
the turbofan engine’s hot-section shaft and several other critical
parts.
Inconel is fairly expensive and is normally not used in firearms for three reasons: (1) cost, (2) lack of necessity (steel, aluminum, and stainless steel have gotten the job done for the last century), and, (3) until now, it’s been fairly difficult to work with.
Indeed, one of the greatest applications for Direct Metal Laser Sintering (and SLS and other metal-sintering additive manufacturing processes) is to make things out of those materials that break or wear down subtractive-manufacturing tools, or need exotic tool bits or inserts. That includes Inconel and Titanium alloys, of course, but we also hear rumors that sintering Tungsten is possible. How recursively self-referential does it get? Imagine 3D printing the tools you need to do final milling on 3D printed parts… that tomorrow could be today very soon.
Our second iteration is composed entirely of Inconel 625, a material that is stronger than Stainless Steel (and a bit heavier) save for the springs which were not 3D Printed. The gun is once again composed of thirty-four 3D Printed components. Our second gun will be stress relieved and post processing will be by hand once again.This is an important note, that last sentence above. The parts don’t come out of the DMLS machine ready to be snapped together — not parts for a precision machine like a firearm. But they go on to note that they’re learning as they go:
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1 comment:
Just read today in the Dec, 2nd issue of Forbes that they are now disguising the downloads so they can't be detected.
So you can still get them IF you can find them.
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