Metal Additive Manufacturing Conference - MAMC 2020

Light weight alloys, but also super alloys are widely used in aerospace industries for large parts. On the one hand the market e.g. for titanium is growing 3.8 % per year to $5.4 Billion in 2030, on the other hand high buy-to-fly ratios of typically 70% due to machining produces incredible amounts of expensive waste. Metal additive manufacturing processes as powder bed fusion give the chance to reduce waste and the amount of parts per assembly, but most technologies are limited in the build area. Plasma Metal Deposition (PMD®) can be used for the manufacturing of large structural parts (0.2 to 2 m) from Ti 6Al 4V, but also Inconel 718/625 or aluminium alloys in a cost-efficient way. Mechanical properties like in standard wrought materials can be achieved. As an outstanding example, the development, manufacturing and material properties of an optical bench demonstrator for the ESA Athena mission is shown. Further results from ongoing R&D are presented.