Melotte wins VOKA INNOVATION AWARD 2009

On the 8th of December last, during the successful and crowded Open Innovation Forum, the Voka - Chamber of Commerce Limburg - presented the Voka Innovation Award to Melotte.

Last year Voka started this new tradition of awarding an innovative company in Limburg calling attention to innovative products, services and processes developed in Limburg. On the other hand the organisation wants to inspire trade and industry by good real practice and encourage to innovate efficiently.

A jury of 7 experts analysed the 17 candidates thoroughly based on some well-considered questions: “Is it an innovative organisation?”, “Is the project well defined, surprising and inspiring?”,”Does the project have market potential?”, “Will the project or company support the image intensification of Limburg as innovative and creative region, nationally as well as internationally?”

After an intensive deliberation the jury selected 6 nominees of which the company Melotte received the highest score at the end.

The jury was impressed by Melotte’s international innovation approach of products and processes. Besides conventional production methods the company’s focus is on manufacturing high-precision parts by means of a complete digital process based on Additive Manufacturing* technologies (* using metal powder Melotte builds products through laser technology).

All positive aspects of Additive Manufacturing i.e. freedom of form, precision, micro dimensions, speed and environment together with the international roll out of Melotte’s new business model in promising markets were tasted well by the jury.

It was a great honour for Mario Fleurinck, CEO of Melotte NV, to receive the award (designed by PHL-student Lore Langendries) from Ms. Ingrid Lieten, Vice-Minister-President of the Flemish Government, Flemish Minister for Innovation, Public Investment, Media and Poverty Reduction.

Leading Belgian magazine "Trends" published rewarding article about Melotte

http://www.melotte.be/MELOTTE/EN/COMPANY/NEWS/29092009.htm

With a technology to produce machine parts from powder Melotte shifts the paradigm on industrial traditions of metal manufacturing in Zonhoven (Belgium). So revolutionary that even low-wage countries cannot compete.

In Zonhoven Melotte’s CEO, Mr Mario Fleurinck, points at the laser robot that in no time produces precision machine parts, cardiac valves and other medical implants layer by layer from fine titanium powder, called Layered Manufacturing.

Direct Digital Manufacturing (DDM) is part of Melotte’s strategic diversification and is considered an innovative complement to the existing high-precision production apparatus. The company works on projects for customers from US, South-Africa, Saudi-Arabia, Malaysia and even China where DDM serves integrally finished products.
The DDM experience of Melotte demonstrates that industrial production flocking to low-wage countries can be considerably reduced by working on an efficient innovation model with interference in design and production methods.
“As digital factory Melotte uses technology which will be very common within fifteen to twenty years.” So the next years Melotte’s CEO wants to go further and build a complete new industrial sector. Surely it is not his intention to produce for the whole world in Zonhoven because this would be contradictory to the vision that materials as well as products need to be transported as little as possible. For that reason subsidiaries will be set up worldwide under Melotte’s flag in order to produce parts close to the end user.

Terry Wohlers from Colorado, an authority in additive or layered manufacturing calls the performance of Melotte impressive. Therefore he invites Mr Fleurinck as guest speaker on the 11th Annual International Wohlers Conference “The Future of Additive Manufacturing” in Frankfurt on December 4 next.

See http://www.euromold.com/index.php?id=115 for more information.

Those of you who are anxious to learn more about Melotte's DDM there is another possibility at MIDEST - Expo 2009 where you can join Mr Fleurinck's lecture about "Direct Digital Manufacturing as Strategic element in advanced Tooling Solutions at Melotte" on Thursday, 19 November 2009 from 4.00 pm till 5.00 pm, l' Espace Conférences 2 (Stand 6 D 7), Paris Nord Villepinte - France.

Layered Manufacturing Association on Linked

A few months ago we launched our Layered Manufacturing Association on Linked. We're absoluely happy with the number of participants today. The Association aims at stimulating cross exchange on layered manufacturing processes and interaction betwee n players worldwide.

Everyone is welcome, we simply ask an open mind and the right balance between publicity and added value. The group is mixed; industry, academic specialists from all over the world get in contact.

Feel free to join and let's discuss and further develop the excited Additive, Layered Manufacturing and Direct Digital Manufacturing market.

Titanium Light-weight / Thin Walled (0,4 mm) OEM parts

Project Purpose: For a leading OEM active in the textile industry we've run a project based on "Industrialisation and mass customized production" of fingers used in yarn processing industries. The part flips, at maximum speed, 3000 times/minute over 180°. In this project a combination of lightweight product re-engineering and “mass” customization is made. The contact angle and the finger quantity change depending on the yarn characteristics. The re-engineered part is hybrid, customized and light-weight.

This project shows the advantages of Thin Walled products in highly dynamic operational environments. The fact that the contact angle has become variable offer the customer the possibility to add value in the process and to integrate with the end-user.

Project Features:

- 3D modeling and business process engineering of thin walled tubes

- Automated contact angle calculation (OEM) and mechanical property analysis (Conventional vs DDM Manufactured)
- FEA analysis
- Complete Part production and assembly from Solid to Model (Direct Manufacturing, coating & high-end component finishing)
- Industrialisation R&D and process definition, 1400 parts per year.

Aerosol Flame Reactor Nozzle Hybrid parts in Inconel 718, 2.4668

Market Release: Industrialisation and serial production of Nozzles used in the production of submicron un- agglomerated solid crystalline particles in an aerosol flame reactor by a spray pyrolysis method. Melotte’s engineering capabilities and experience in Inconel 718 conventional machining in combination with the Near-To-Net-Shape DDM methods are key in the product re-engineering of these process critical parts. The re-engineered part is hybrid and versatile. It took us about 4 months to run the entire project. We've used following features:

- 3D modeling and reverse engineering of complex features via optical scanning (free forms) and mechanical property analysis (Conventional versus Layered Manufactured)
- Thermodynamic analysis on nozzle outlet. (influence thermal expansion on booster properties)
- Complete Part production and assembly from Solid to Model (Direct Manufacturing & high-end component finishing)
- Industrialisation R&D and process definition, 200 parts/year

We thank our customer for giving us the ability to share this project with our Blogreaders! Thanks Phil!

Lightweight Solutions based on DDM Technology

Market Release: The economical climate has positive effects on the way people look at our developments, in the past few weeks we’ve run multiple projects based on weight-saving programs. Although most of them are “not for publication” we’re proud to highlight a project for the next generation automotive industry, the one focusing on Solar cars…. Melotte supports the Belgian Solar team since many years, at this year’s edition we’ve done two important projects. The first one is another weight saving project on magnetic in-wheel motor, this is a pure multitask milling project, the second one is full DDM project and contributes substantially on this year’s challenge to minimize excess material.

In the past the team used a conventional steering wheel made out of aluminum, the raw material (4,5 Kg) was milled down to a basic geometry. Given the tight space in Solar car’s cockpit the conventional steering wheel did not feel comfortable. Driving the car down-under in extreme climate conditions pushed the engineers to develop a mono-block full titanium light-weight steering wheel. Based on FEA analysis’s we’ve come to the conclusion that we could hollow-out the part and take the walls down to 0,8 mm. All this results in a huge weight saving, above we’ve been able to reduce Buy-To-Fly ratio’s from 4,5 Kg (conventional milled) to 0,3 Kg, DDM based on layer manufacturing. Another good example of Carbon Footprint optimization and more precise a raw material saving of about 90%. Finally we’ve realized a nice piece of engineering and we wish the Solar Team all the best during The World Solar Challenge in Australia!

E-Texturing is a revolution in digital manufacturing

Market Release: Since a few months we’re actively developing e-texturing features on DDM parts. Mainly we add texture (soft gripping, leather texturing, topographical features) on 3D solids and produce these in a Direct Digital way. Instead of having advanced post-processing treatments such as milling/EDM, we simply add it on the surface of the digital model (STL based). Tests have been made on thin walled parts, mould inserts and even on some medical implants. All of them being ready for market release as from now!

e-Texture is one of the latest software solutions of Materialise. The software enables to apply a 3D Texture on a 3D digital model. The uniqueness of e-Texture is that the texture will thus be applied during printing and not after printing, resulting in time and cost savings. Lieve Boeykens, Sales Manager at Materialise says: “In house we can experiment enough with printing plastics, however having no own metal machine, we have to rely on our good relations with Melotte.” Being both partner of the Belgium Solar Team (http://www.solarteam.be/ ), a project was easily defined to print the first model in titanium with a leather texture immediately applied during printing. The pictures shows the first result coming from Melotte’s DDM set-up. The part is thin walled (0,8 mm) and freeform, cost savings are important and most of all, we respect extremely short delivery times and can easily confirm the accuracy by showing the optical comparison. Another good example of what DDM can bring to you!

Melotte@ a glance

Digital Factory movie: For overseas customers it’s not easy to get a good view on our Direct Digital Manufacturing Set-up. Therefore we’ve create a movie that shows all the aspects of our vertically integrated Direct Digital Manufacturing shop. The video shows the digital chain, from 3D file over powder to finished high precision part. This movie was shown at the Rapid Manufacturing General Assembly, held last month in Brussels. Now it’s more obvious for RM users to decide on the digital chain. You can find the movie on www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOwBZRLlwl4

Last month the Belgian commercial Television channel VTM reported on our Digital Factory as well. This has been a big success, we’ve become a curiosum in Belgium’s technology garden… Please feel free and have a look at www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWX4VcE81Ck

We’re happy to announce the release of our new Inconell 600 grade material, this material is now available for DDM. Early august we’ll release other materials.