News Highlights:
- Speed, quality and economic advantages delivered by HP Metal Jet enable rapid path to serial production of 3D-printed metal parts
- Production run of more than 10,000 high quality parts produced for the visionary ID.3 launch event
- Collaboration with HP and GKN leading to breakthrough innovation
Wolfsburg – November 6, 2019 — Last year Volkswagen selected HP Metal Jet, the world’s most advanced 3D printing technology for the high volume manufacturing of production-grade metal parts, as the foundation for its strategy to industrialize additive manufacturing with a multi-year design and production roadmap. With a production run of more than 10,000 high quality parts produced by HP and GKN Powder Metallurgy in just a few weeks to support the visionary ID.3 electric vehicle launch event, Volkswagen reached a key milestone in the first stage of its three-phase strategic roadmap to functional production.
“Our vision to industrialize additive manufacturing is quickly becoming a reality with HP Metal Jet, it is a game changer for the automotive industry,” said Dr. Martin Goede, Head of Technology Planning and Development, Volkswagen. “The pace of innovation by HP and advanced capabiltiies of the technology have exceeded our expectations. We are meeting our milestones and are actively identifying and developing functional parts for production.”
Dr. Goede expanded on the important milestone, and the work Volkswagen and HP are doing together on the path to mass production, in this video.
The production of the ID.3 models represents the successful execution of the first step of Volkswagen’s strategic roadmap for Metal Jet production beginning with mass customization and cosmetic parts. In subsequent phases Volkswagen intends to integrate Metal Jet printed structural parts into the next generation of vehicles as quickly as possible and are targeting a continuous increase inpart size and technical requirements – with the future goal of soccer-size parts of 50.000 to 100.000 per year. Examples of higher performance functional parts with significant structural requirements e.g. gearshift knobs and mirror mounts. As new platforms such as electric vehicles enter mass production, HP Metal Jet is expected to be leveraged for additional applications such as the lightweighting of fully safety-certified metal parts.