The Making Of A Medical 3D Printed Metal Implant (Steve Fournier - LinkedIn)
From “black” to “grey metal powder” magic of 3D printing
Medical applications are among the top growing use cases of metal additive manufacturing. Unlike aerospace applications where weight reduction is the key benefit of interest, for medical users, the capability of mass customization is where 3D printing becomes an enabling and powerful tool for the fabrication of:
1. Medical models (for surgery or diagnostics assistance)
2. Surgery guides (to ease and optimize the surgery process)
3. Body implants (customized replacements)
In this article, we are focusing on body implants, for which the key benefits are a) ease of customization for each patient, and b) enhanced part performance (better mechanical strength, better fusion with the bone structure, better fit, fewer screws required, etc.)
However, before thinking that surgeons will soon be producing their own metal implants in their office, let’s have a closer look at what are the manufacturing steps required before to get a very cool-looking implant:
Implant manufacturing: not quite a press-button process…
Let’s take for example the production process o...
