Abstract
Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies are appropriate manufacturing technologies to produce low rotation products of high added value. Products in the spare parts business usually have discontinuous demand levels of reduced numbers of parts. Indeed, spare parts inventories handle myriad of products that require big immobilized investments while having an intrinsic risk of no-use (for example due to obsolescence or spoilage). Based on these issues, the present work analyses the fundamental cost factors in a real case study of a company dedicated to the supply of spare parts for fluid conduction systems. Real inventory data is assessed to determine the product taxonomy and its associated costs. A representative product of the stock is analyzed in detail on original manufacturing costs, in AM costs and then redesigned with topological optimization to reduce the AM cost levels (via design for additive manufacturing). A general equation for cost assessment is formulated. Given the specific data collected from the company, the parameters in this general equation are calculated. Finally, the general equation and the product cost reduction achieved are used to explore the potential economic impact of the use of AM technologies in the cost levels of manufacturing and stocking of spare part products.
Highlights
Companies providing supplies of spare parts are usually obliged to hold large sets of stocks.These inventory parts cause many issues to the companies, in the form of costs, warehouse space and logistic implications
A representative product of the stock is analyzed in detail on original manufacturing costs, in Additive manufacturing (AM) costs and redesigned with topological optimization to reduce the AM cost levels
The presented case study methodology is grounded in the real circumstances of Unistral Recambios, a company that belongs to the Fluidra group, which accounted for a total price list cost of spare parts held in the inventory books over 15 M€ in 2017
Summary
Companies providing supplies of spare parts are usually obliged to hold large sets of stocks These inventory parts cause many issues to the companies, in the form of costs, warehouse space and logistic implications. Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies are perceived as a very powerful tool to address mass product customization, delocalized production and short series manufacturing, by maneuvering in relatively low levels of cost and short delivery periods for short series of products. This means that AM technologies could change the way that the companies supplying spare parts organize their business. The common case studies focus on the improvement and switch in production methods for very specific selected parts that, yield major potential results
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