It is believed that many people have heard about the advantages of 3D printers. It has been more than 30 years since Charles hull, an American scientist, developed the world's first 3D printer in 1986. However, in recent years, it has come into people's attention and caused heated discussion. 3D printer can be used in international space station, medical field, automobile industry, electronic industry and so on. 3D printing is favored by many scholars, saying that it has a promising future and can even subvert some industries.

Take the car we get along with day and night, 3D printer advantage application in automobile manufacturing has not been a new thing for a long time. In 2010, a 6:1 model car using 3D printer technology was developed by Jim Kor team in the United States, which is also the first 3D printing car in the world. However, the first car that can run out of 3D printing is a small two seater family car named "strati" designed and manufactured by local motors in 2014. The car uses a large 3D printer to make 40 parts, and the body is integrated.

The other parts such as transmission system, suspension, battery, tire, circuit, electric motor and so on are made by traditional technology. It takes 45 hours from the production of parts to the assembly of the car, with a total of 49 parts. Compared with the well-known traditional car composed of tens of thousands of parts, "strati" can be said to be very simple.

However, over the years, 3D printer technology has not fully covered the traditional vehicle manufacturing, which is in the state of concept publicity more than practical application. In the traditional automobile manufacturing industry, such as logo, fender, steering wheel, dashboard and other common parts, 3D printing has been successfully applied. However, the 3D printing technology of high-performance components remains to be explored. But in March, Honda's R & D department teamed up with software company Autodesk to design a crank shaft and use 3D printing technology to make samples. It is reported that this kind of crank shaft can achieve 30% weight reduction compared with the traditional crank shaft. However, the crank shaft, the core part of the engine, has a high working strength and needs to be further tested for its wear resistance. If the crank shaft can be successfully used in mass production vehicles, does it mean that more and more high-performance parts can be manufactured with 3D printer technology? The answer is yes, but it's not realistic yet. There are many advantages of 3D printer, waiting for our exploration.

Sources from: https://creality3dpro.store/blogs/news