Additive Manf. SOA, The Orca Unleashed

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  • DadSmith

    Grandmaster
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    Oct 21, 2018
    22,193
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    Ripley County
    GE is doing 3D printed parts for the CFM LEAP engine, and my employer is working with the technology.

    Generally, I believe most of the work has been with sintered metals using fairly powerful lasers.

    Personally I don't believe we are too far from 3D printing everything, including barrels and bolts. There will likely need to be post printing processing, but the initial form will be 3D printed.
    How strong are metal and plastic printed parts?
     

    ghuns

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    2   0   0
    Nov 22, 2011
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    There are Metal 3D printers out there, they are pricey I think. I was at a talk about 3D printers a few years back, and they had samples from the metal printer. So I am sure they are better than they were 5 or 6 years ago, and likely at least a little cheaper.
    This one 3d prints and finish machines your parts. The smaller sized one starts at about $1 million...

     

    Leadeye

    Grandmaster
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    4   0   0
    Jan 19, 2009
    36,696
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    .
    How strong are metal and plastic printed parts?

    I think plastic parts like Nylon would be strong enough for the internal revolver parts I'm looking for. Metal was used in the past because that's what was available. The wear characteristics probably will not be as good, but you don't shoot 150 year old guns very often.
     
    Rating - 100%
    4   0   0
    Mar 9, 2022
    2,173
    113
    Bloomington
    I've done a couple of his lowers, and have been really impressed, so now I really, really wanna try and build an orca now. Sadly, I only started my firearms journey relatively recently in life, and have yet to accumulate that bin of spare AR parts everyone else seems to have lying around, and by the time I would buy the barrel, BCG, and other parts needed piecemeal, it would probably cost more than getting a cheap pre-assembled upper, so I can't quite seem to justify the cost to myself. And I can't to justify it by buying nicer parts either, because as impressive as the orca is, it's just not at the point where it can maintain a level of accuracy that would take advantage of a nice barrel or other components.

    First world problems...
     

    BroodXI

    Sharpshooter
    Rating - 100%
    7   0   0
    Sep 15, 2010
    599
    43
    Salem
    I've done a couple of his lowers, and have been really impressed, so now I really, really wanna try and build an orca now. Sadly, I only started my firearms journey relatively recently in life, and have yet to accumulate that bin of spare AR parts everyone else seems to have lying around, and by the time I would buy the barrel, BCG, and other parts needed piecemeal, it would probably cost more than getting a cheap pre-assembled upper, so I can't quite seem to justify the cost to myself. And I can't to justify it by buying nicer parts either, because as impressive as the orca is, it's just not at the point where it can maintain a level of accuracy that would take advantage of a nice barrel or other components.

    First world problems...

    i think hoffman has 3d printed fcg as well
     
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