Hybrid component manufacturing – combining forging and metal 3D printing

Abstract

Up to now, highly stressed components have been forged, heat-treated and then mechanically machined. However, when it comes to complex components, this is associated with very high investments of time and effort in mechanical machining and thus high costs. An illustration of these disadvantages is the production of a compressor wheel as installed in a conventional thermal flow machine for power generation. Up to now, the flow blades have been elaborately milled from the solid material. Owing to the high machining volume and the associated costly mechanical processing, the production of a compressor wheel becomes very expensive and very resource-intensive. Rosswag GmbH has therefore set itself the goal to optimise the process chain of the manufacturing processes and thus increasing efficiency in the manufacture of certain components.