NEW BOOK 🙂

I’m proud to announce that we basically reached an agreement with SPRINGER-NATURE (the recognized best publisher in science and technology) for the upcoming book: Pires, J. Norberto, Amin S. Azar, “Additive-manufacturing robots: Fundamentals, Technologies and Systems”, Springer-Nature Book, Switerland, May, 2019 I want to thank my co-author, Amin S. Azar, for joining me in this project, a key researcher at the Materials processing and modelling group at SINTEF (Norway) – a research group managed by Dr. Mohammed M’Hamdi. I want also to thank Springer-NATURE (Switzerland) for the trust and support, namely my editor Anthony Doyle.

It was/is a pleasure working with you Amin.

همکاری با تو تجربه خوبی بود, امین

Abstract of the BOOK

This book is about additive manufacturing of large metal parts. Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies have recently turned into a mainstream production method in many industries. The adoption of new manufacturing scenarios led to the necessity of cross-disciplinary developments by combining several fields such as materials, robotics and computer programming. In the 1980s the rapid prototyping method was developed as a way to produce 3D objects, layer by layer, directly from CAD packages. It was a significant advance in industry, since models and prototypes could be easily produced. Additive Manufacturing (AM) extended significantly this concept, just by introducing a set of technologies that allow a 3D object to be built by the simple process of adding layer upon layer of material until reaching the desired shape. The main advantage of the Additive Manufacturing (AM) is the versatility of the concept, which allows to create virtually any 3D shape, since they are all bases in layer-by-layer manufacturing. Consequently, modelling and prototyping were the first applications. But quickly it started to be applied to manufacturing of small series, tricky parts, etc., and are now seriously considered for the production of large metal parts that are difficult to manufacture in traditional manufacturing plants, i.e., using traditional manufacturing technologies. Also, producing complex 3D parts, for several industries, including aeronautics and space, seems easier and more efficient if AM is included in the manufacturing process. In fact, AM has grown significantly in the past years, especially because of the industrial interest on the subject. However, it is important to clarify that AM is not just limited to the commonly used printers, optimized to build plastic parts. ASTM committee, published a set of standards which describe all the current 7 classes of AM technology. As in the conventional technologies, each AM technology uses specifics materials, since the genetics of the processes does not allow a full material coverage. AM promises to overcome many boundaries imposed by conventional manufacturing technologies such as the production limitations of components with complex geometries/shape, and the excessive waste of material due to excessive wall thickness or the type of the technological process. However, it is important to notice that in an industrial environment, all of these AM technologies are only possible due to the integration of multidisciplinary areas. Industrial robot manipulators have been allied with AM technologies due to the fact that they are machines with a huge potential in this field, since they have natural characteristics that make them enabled to perform AM tasks such as the ability to perform repetitive tasks, a high reliability and performance, easy to program and control, and, the ability to fabricate large components, an option that is challenging for common AM machines. In summary, the robot-assisted AM technologies are paving the way to become an eminent part of the factories of the future. It is hard to ensure that by implementing these technologies, the challenges will be settled. Nevertheless, it is undeniable that it will help to reach a commonly acceptable resolution. In this line, the major contribution would be in terms of elevating the grade of these machinery to reach the level of plug-and-play and higher autonomy, with the objective of eliminating the inconveniences and challenges in programming of these advanced machines for executing a sophisticated printing task. This book covers all the major AM technologies and discusses how they can be implemented using industrial robots. It pays considerable attention to system and software aspects, trying to define the rules to interface with existing software packages (simulation and material selection) and databases (materials). We expect that it could be a reference in this area, providing the valuable information that any engineer and scientist working in this area needs to have things done and to understand how things work.

Bellow 1st page of the contract with Springer-Nature for this book: