BEYOND SURFACES

Solutions In an example of our brand’s com- plementary expertise, Oerlikon AM partnered on an internal project with Oerlikon Barmag, a global leader in technology developments for process plants in the manmade fiber industry. Gear metering pumps, one of the core components, are used worldwide as carriers of technology in plants in the chemical, plastics, paint and varnish industries as well as in PUR 1 applications. Two components for pumps were optimized simultaneously. The idea came to Klaus Lorenz, Head of Pump Design at Oerlikon Barmag, during a cross-divisional teleconfer- ence: “Colleagues from Oerlikon AM presented an AM solution to an industrial customer. That’s when I had the idea that this could also improve the design of our pump components.” He found a congenial partner and colleague for this in Ralph Merget, who says: “Additive manufacturing also offers the advantage of enabling extremely fast development. Without much effort or using auxiliary tools, you just print a test part from a data set — it’s 3-dimensional CAD data. This means that a new idea can be ‘tried out’ in a cost-effective and uncomplicated way, and you can see immediately where there is still room for improvement — until you find the perfect solution.” “our engineers are experts in co-engineering. We want to explain to our customers which parts of their products would be suitable for additive manufacturing.” Ralph Merget, Vertical Lead Business Development Automotive, Industry & Tooling, Oerlikon AM pUmp ComponenTS RAdICAlly ReThoUghT: RedUCTIon FoR moRe SImplICITy 14