ESA prints 3D metal shape in space for first time

The European Space Agency (ESA) has shown off the first 3D metal part printed on the International Space Station (ISS). 3D printing aboard the ISS is nothing new – a device capable of producing plastic parts in microgravity was launched to the space station ten years ago, but plastic only goes so far. However, printing parts …

[Gene Cash]

IMPRESSIVE

The FDM plastic stuff was a stunt, as a properly designed FDM machine can print upside down, so zero-gee is not a problem.

However, all the metal printing machines I've seen rely on precise layers of powdered material being pushed onto a pile of existing material, which is then melted with a laser onto the rest of the object being formed.

That definitely depends on gravity to keep everything in place, so it would be interesting to see how this works. It's got to be fundamentally different.

[elsergiovolador]

Re: IMPRESSIVE

depends on gravity

That gravity must feel so much pressure...

[Tom Chiverton 1]

Re: IMPRESSIVE

Just use magnets

[gl33k]

Re: IMPRESSIVE

that's a force

[Snowy]

Re: IMPRESSIVE

If they had a spill of the metal "dust" cleaning up the metal dust in a low G environment would be rather hard. More so if was also conductive.

[Andrew Scott]

Re: IMPRESSIVE

maybe even toxic if the dust is breathed in.

[bud-weis-er]

Saying this with respect..

From my viewpoint, all the cool stuff is happening in the space industry at the moment.

Just incase I'm missing anything, anyone know any other "cool" industries (apart from AI/ML, I'm strictly a power user of these and use other peoples' work)?

[John Brown (no body)]

Re: Saying this with respect..

Probably, in most industries. It's just either not making the news at the moment or it's areas you or I have little direct interest in so don't notice it. Fusion (still 50 years away, natch!), fission (thorium in particular), batteries and/or other storage tech, more efficient solar panels, more efficient electric motors (Evs), generators (wind turbines), one I just saw the other day was pumped storage using a "slurry" meaning far lower head needed for the upper storage for the same result, may or may not work at scale, and probably dozens of others I'm forgetting about or not aware of.

[Filippo]

Re: Saying this with respect..

There's pretty good stuff going on in batteries. It looks like we should eventually get BEVs with as much range as ICEs, a lot safer, and that charge as fast as you can deliver power to them.

Biotech and biomedical also comes up with really cool stuff all the time. It's a field where it takes a very long time before you actually get something usable, though.

[Anonymous Coward]

Test speciments?

3 of the printed parts look suspiciously like tensile test specimens. The others look too slender for compressive testing, but I suspect they will be sectioned and looked at to examine the quality of the printed parts...

[david 12]

Re: Test speciments?

The others look too slender for compressive testing,

Look like notch test specimens - Charpy impact test.

[CowHorseFrog]

let me know when they 3d print something made of composite parts of different materials instead of shitty plastic parts.

[Homo.Sapien.Floridanus]

Printing in spaaaace

NASA: 3D printer experiment is go, the world is watching.

Astronaut: Roger that Mission Control [pressing buttons].

Printer: WE HAVE DETECTED AN UNAUTHORIZED THIRD PARTY CARTRIDGE….

[EricB123]

Re: Printing in spaaaace

I remember in the early ISS days, they tried to patch a phone call through to whomever was the USA president back then.

They got the all too familiar recording "The number you have reached is not a working number. Please try again".

[John Smith 19]

It's a start

Note this sort of stuff is heavily ground controlled because astronaut time is very expensive and a proper space rated control system is eyewateringly expensive.