Oqton Build Quality has been launched to monitor and trace the quality of 3D printed parts and evaluate build performance – alerting users to faults and allowing projects to be saved or jettisoned, allowing for increased production efficiencies and build success.
Oqton Build Quality encompasses 3DXpert Build Simulation, MOS Build Monitoring, and 3DXpert Build Inspection to monitor the entire manufacturing process and mitigate anomalies resulting from errors during the build setup, printing, or with materials.
Detecting and correcting anomalies early in the process helps ensure the success of each build — from first article inspection through final part — enabling manufacturers to develop repeatable processes for prototyping and production that efficiently yield high-quality parts while reducing costs.
3DXpert Build Simulation begins the overall process, predicting printability issues and avoiding parts overheating. Once the build begins, MOS Build Monitoring monitors, controls, and alerts the additive manufacturing print process in real time. This capability has been developed in cooperation with Oqton’s strategic partner, Baker Hughes, using AI-based models to detect potential defects during printing – highlighting them in a traffic-light warning system that means the users can take appropriate action even remotely.
Build Monitoring enables users to track and trace every layer of every part and take corrective actions to build credibility of the process, maintain quality, and eliminate monetary loss related to failed parts.
When completed, parts move into quality inspection to ensure the final parts are free of defects to meet the design and usage specifications. Users can analyse the final parts aligned to what was anticipated during build preparation and simulation. If anomalies have occurred in the final part, corrective actions can be taken to the part design and print process to improve the part quality in future builds, maximising output, with plans afoot to help automate this function in future versions.
“Recently, metal additive manufacturing has evolved as a technology for reliable serial production of end-use parts,” said Tomasso Tamarozzi, product director, additive manufacturing, inspection & simulation, Oqton. “However, the industry still had to take very deliberate measures to ensure that production quality was held to very high standards.
“There was a lack of standardised procedures, disparate hardware components, and multiple software vendors, but not one reliable solution. With the introduction of Build Quality, Oqton is delivering a single actionable, reliable solution that addresses all these aspects.
“Through collaboration with strategic partners, such as Baker Hughes and our colleagues in 3D Systems, Oqton can provide a reliable printer-agnostic solution built on AI and physics-based simulation.”
