Sciaky enters R&D initiative with Aubert & Duval and Airbus

Chicago-based Sciaky Inc., a subsidiary of Phillips Service Industries Inc. and provider of metal AM systems, has entered into an R&D initiative with Aubert & Duval and Airbus, driven by the Saint Exupéry Institute for Research in Technology (IRT).

The Production Engineering laboratory of the National School of Engineering in Tarbes, France, will serve as an academic partner for the project, named Metallic Advanced Materials for Aeronautics (MAMA).

The goal is to couple traditional, high-power closed-die forging with emerging wire-fed metal 3D printing techniques—in this case, Sciaky’s Electron Beam Additive Manufacturing (EBAM) process—to develop new processes for manufacturing titanium alloys aircraft parts.

EBAM systems can produce parts from 8 in. to 19 ft. long at gross deposition rates up to 25 lbs. of metal per hour. The system’s real-time adaptive metal control system can sense and digitally self-adjust metal deposition.