Abstract
Additive manufacturing or three-dimensional (3D) printing offers tremendous opportunities for the automotive industry to reduce vehicle weight and improve vehicle performance through consolidating parts, tailoring material properties, enabling multifunctional components, and simplifying manufacturing processes. However, additive manufacturing research for direct manufacturing of automotive components is limited, partially because of the sheer volume of automotive production. In this paper, we explore the potential of direct manufacturing of metallic vehicle components using additive manufacturing coupled with the generative design approach. Using a radar mounting bracket as an example, we show that desired part strength and safety performance can be achieved with 42 % weight reduction and simplified manufacturing and assembly process. A production cost analysis was also conducted based on two mainstream additive manufacturing systems. The result suggests that the cost of metal powder is the limiting factor for wider adoption of additive manufacturing in the automotive industry.
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