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Realize works extensively with Indesign on a wide variety of projects. We are excited and proud of the long relationship we have established with this fantastic company. We talked with Jerry Gotway, CEO of Indesign, to find out how their business uses Additive Manufacturing and where they are headed in the future.

Tell me about your business…

We are an electronic product design engineering company. We develop a wide variety of electronic products for our customers. We do full turn key product development. That means we do the mechanical design, the electrical design, and embedded software design. We  create all the design information for a product then send it to a factory for manufacturing.

How is Rapid Prototyping used by your company?

In our product development process we go through several steps. In the front end of the process we are working on the development of requirements and concepts with the client, then we move on to the detailed mechanical design. As soon as that is completed we need to take that design which exists in our CAD systems and turn it into a working prototype. It’s absolutely critical that we get working prototypes of the designs for us to validate the design. Those working prototypes include the kinds of things that Realize can provide. The Stereolithography models, the cast models and sometimes the rubber parts are needed for the physical elements of our prototype. The critical need that we have is to get those rapid prototype parts. We need to very quickly get a physical embodiment of what we have designed so we can run that through our testing process.

What types of projects do you partner with Realize on?

We have worked with Realize on a wide variety of projects- from medical to consumer electronics, industrial, and they have provided us with parts to support our clients in many different markets.

How has your experience working with Realize been?

Our experience has been very positive. Everything that we do here has to be done very quickly. We have very rapid product realization intervals. Realize has been extremely good to Indesign in delivering parts very quickly. Speed isn’t everything, the other thing that is very important to us is quality. We have received high quality parts using the prototyping capabilities of Realize. Speed and quality are the two things that are most important to us and we get both of those from Realize.

Where is your business headed in the future?

Our company has been in business for 16 years and it’s been on an evolutionary path. We started exclusively in the telecommunications area and now we are into many different industries. The technologies have changed dramatically over time. When we started we were almost all wired types of products, now half of our business is wireless. We are going to follow where technology leads.

Indesign is an engineering design services firm with a proven track record of helping companies develop new electronic devices. Engineering disciplines consist of electrical/circuit design, RF/wireless design, software/firmware design, mechanical design, human factors design, and testing/validation with a strong emphasis on products utilizing embedded microprocessors and DSPs.

The Realize Q&A with…Tim Caffrey, Associate Consultant, Wohlers Associates, Inc.

Tim Caffrey earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering at the University of New Mexico. Caffrey was employed by The Boeing Company for 10 years, including four years directing the operation of the company’s in-house additive-manufacturing (AM) services. Caffrey served as plant manager of Plynetics Express—which was, at the time, the world’s largest AM service provider. His 18 years of writing experience includes aircraft engine maintenance and pre-fight test procedures for Boeing, engine case repair procedures for Pratt & Whitney, technical content for the web, and advertising copywriting at Walmart’s corporate headquarters.

Caffrey has worked closely with Wohlers Associates since 2000 on this annual industry study and many other projects. Caffrey’s role at the company expanded in 2011 and has since been working on a wide range of consulting projects. He also speaks and represents Wohlers Associates at national and international events.

Realize is scanning the globe for Additive Manufacturing industry experts to share their views about where we are today and where the future will take us.

Where do you see the industry going in the next 5 years?

The industry will continue to grow in two distinctly different directions. On one end of the spectrum, we’ll see the low-cost personal 3D printers improve in performance, offer additional materials, and drop in price. We (Wohlers Associates) don’t think every home will own a 3D printer though; the more likely scenario is web-based service providers and 3D print shops analogous to today’s 2D print shops like Staples, Office Depot, and FedEx Office. On the other end of the spectrum, we’ll see industrial systems designed for specific applications, specific industries, or even specific individual parts. Speed, max part size, and the selection of materials will all increase. We’ll see hybrid systems that perform more than one operation, both additive and subtractive.

There has been a ‘new generation’ of users exposed to AM/RP/3DP over the past few years, along with a huge media buzz.  How do you see this camp and the ‘old school’ camp coming together?

Initially, these two camps were indeed cut off from one another. One user went to RAPID and to user group meetings. The other user went to maker faires and community hacker meetings. Now we’re seeing overlap at new types of shows, like the “Inside 3D Printing” series. Also, we’ll begin to see new 3D printers that can be used by both camps in the $3,000 to $8,000 price range. These will be purchased by the “old school” companies and by the makers, and that’ll have a unifying effect.
Still, one could argue that these two camps should be separate. They share one thing: layered additive manufacturing. But a $1,000 open-source material extrusion system has absolutely nothing else in common with an electron beam, metal powder bed fusion system in a production environment making orthopedic implants, for example. These two users have vastly different requirements and needs from their respective user communities.

What challenges/opportunities do you feel service providers, like Realize, face today?

In some ways, nothing has changed. SPs need to find and keep customers. How? Delivering a service that is valuable to the customer, delivering something the customer can’t (or doesn’t want to) do themselves.
There’s an educational aspect. Explaining the differences in quality, materials, repeatability, etc. Also, offering A to Z service, from CAD to urethane castings and high-quality finishing. Even a knowledgeable OEM that owns a machine or two probably does not have all these capabilities in its arsenal.

What are some misconceptions about the capabilities of the technologies?

1-That it’s a pushbutton technology. As you know, there’s a lot of work, craft, art, and science required pre- and post-build.
2-That everyone will someday own and operate a 3D printer.
3-That you can make an airplane engine fuel nozzle in a $795 printer.
4-That the industry just appeared overnight.
5-That printing guns is a safety and security issue. Really, it’s just another extreme endorsement of 2nd amendment rights.
6-That 3D printing is a less-expensive form of manufacturing. It’s can be, but not necessarily.
7. That 3D printing is more energy efficient than conventional manufacturing. It can be, but not necessarily. Most analysis to date suggests just the opposite.

How do you think 3D printing can change the way we live in the future?

I like to think we’ll develop into smarter consumers and product designers, and reverse the “Walmart-ification” of retail, which I define as the selling and buying of millions of cheap junk items that break too soon. We’ll see products that are well designed and manufactured, they might be personalized, they may cost more, but they will last longer and function in a better way.
As I said, we don’t think there will be a 3D printer in every home next to the HP inkjet printer. Even people that design or co-design online will still go the the 3D print shop around the corner or click the “Print” button on the online part portal.

How would you describe AM/RP/3DP to someone who has never been exposed to it?

The software slices a computer file of a 3D geometry into very thin layers. The AM machine builds the 3D part by successively stacking these thin layers. Each new layer bonds to the layer before it. There are seven different ways these layers are created, from glueing sheets of paper together to using a laser to melt metal powder. The machines run unattended, but a significant amount of labor is needed for preparing the file and the machine and for cleaning and finishing the parts after the build is complete.