Page 16 - 3D Metal Printing Fall 2019

3D FEATURE Metal AM:
The Newest Tool in the Shed
...at RPG Industries, a full-service multiprocess machine shop, tool builder and production manufacturer in Western Ohio. “We always strive to stay at the leading edge of technology,” says company owner Robert Ginsburg, “and that’s where 3D metal printing fits.” BY BRAD F. KUVIN, EDITORIAL DIRECTOR
Ready to begin its 25th year of oper- ation in 2020, RPG Industries stands as a testament to how diversification and “outside-the-box” thinking can pay dividends, in what has proven for many to be a challenging mar- ket for relatively small manufacturers. What began as a wire EDM job shop in Tipp City, OH, as the brainchild of owner Robert Ginsburg, has blossomed into a full-service multifaceted manufacturing company. Its resume now includes expert- ise in conventional and small-hole EDM, as well as wire EDM. RPG also offers abra- sive waterjet cutting, CNC machining and turning, and—most recently—additive manufacturing (AM). RPG boasts a full workload of projects for the tool and die industry, and has now evolved to add pro- totype and small-lot production.
“We’ve grown consistently year over year,” says Ginsburg, noting that the 16,000-sq.-ft. shop (of which 12,000 sq. ft. is for manufacturing) now boasts 13 employees, up from eight just a year ago. The shop moves 20 to 30 active jobs through at any given time, for customers in a variety of industries including power transmission (turbomachinery), automo- tive, aerospace, medical and construction. With such a variety of jobs and customers,
RPG added this Markforged Metal X early in 2019. The machine employs the atomic diffusion additive manufacturing process, and boasts a build volume of 11.8 by 8.7 by 7.1 in.
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and relatively short runs, reducing setup times on its machines—EDM and CNC machining for example—helped to bring Ginsburg to the world of AM.
Composite Printing of Fixtures, Tooling
“A couple of years ago, a machinery vendor of ours, Columbus Advanced Man- ufacturing, introduced us to the Mark- forged composite printer,” recalls Gins- burg. “We quickly began using it to efficiently build custom workpiece fixtures and tooling for our CNC machines. That allows us to design and build custom jaws in less than a day, for example, that fit into our existing CNC milling machine vise. We also use the composite printer to build wire EDM workholding tooling.”
His experience with the composite 3D printer helped convince Ginsburg to give the Markforged metal-printing machine, the Metal X, a try, and he brought that machine into the fold in January 2019. The Metal X, as described by Markforged, prints using metal powder bound in a plastic matrix, eliminating the safety risks associated with traditional powder-bed printing. Markforged calls the process atomic diffusion additive manufacturing (ADAM). It includes building parts up from printed layers, sending them through a washing stage to remove some of the binder, and then sintering the printed parts to fuse the powder into solid metal. The heated print chamber provides a build volume to 11.8 by 8.7 by 7.1 in.
“We felt that there would be immediate