Lifecycle design and management of additive manufacturing technologies

Additive manufacturing (AM) is being proposed as a revolutionary manufacturing technology, promising significant advantages both from a design and production perspective. One challenge is the disruptive nature of AM and its impact on all life cycle phases. This paper reports from a demonstrator project highlighting digitalization and process implications. A demonstrator tool was developed able to collectively capture and visualize different life cycle implications of AM products. Market expectations, technology characteristics and life cycle constraints were met in the demonstrator tool. Each individual part collected its own traceable data set, from design over manufacturing up to postproduction services. Key aspects demonstrated were 1) the need to represent any manufacturing and life cycle constraint already in design, 2) the need to integrate unique identifiers that build a digital twin and 3) the need to automate links between life cycle engineering steps.