Sandvik Materials Continues to Invest in Additive Manufacturing

Sandvik Materials has increased its capacity for metal additive manufacturing (AM) by installing several Renishaw RenAM 500Q quad laser machines. The company is collaborating with Renishaw in materials development, AM process technologies and postprocessing. This expansion follows a 200 million SEK (about $22.2 million) investment in a plant for the manufacturing of titanium and nickel powders for AM, which will complement Sandvik’s existing Osprey powder offering to include most alloy groups.

Sandvik has the in-house capability to produce a broad portfolio of alloys, coupled with the metallurgical expertise to customize the best material for every application. 

“We work closely with our customers to tailor alloys in line with their exact requirements, even for small batch print runs,” says Annika Roos, head of the Powder division. “Not only do we match the alloy to the purpose, we can also optimize the particle size for the chosen printing process.”

The multi-laser RenAM 500Q systems complement Sandvik’s existing AM machines, which include printers from EOS, Concept Laser, Arcam and ExOne. The machines cover a wide range of printing technologies for different materials and applications.

When it comes to AM, the company says, no two use cases are the same—the balance of weight, strength, hardness, thermal characteristics, flexibility, geometric complexity, surface finish and other characteristics varies from one application to the next. Therefore, Sandvik works across the value chain from component selection, AM-design and modeling, through material choice/development and optimal printing process, to postprocessing, testing and quality assurance.

According to Kristian Egeberg, president of Sandvik Additive Manufacturing, printing is one of seven steps a manufacturer must take to master a perfect AM component, therefore they must think beyond printing to get the best value from AM.