Methods, systems, and apparatus, including medium-encoded computer program products, for computer aided design and manufacture of physical structures using hybrid additive and subtractive manufacturing include, in one aspect, a method including: obtaining data for 3D geometry of a part; simulating at least a portion of a manufacturing process that includes adding first material in a first stage and removing second material in a second, subsequent stage, where the second material includes a portion of the first material, removing the second material includes blending between the material added in the first and second stages, and thermal effects of adding and removing the material in the first and second stages is simulated; and adjusting an amount of the portion based on results of the simulating to prevent deviation of the part from the three dimensional geometry that results in not enough material being available for the blending.

The present disclosure provides three-dimensional (3D) printing methods, apparatuses, and systems using, inter alia, a controller that regulates formation of at least one 3D object (e.g., in real time during the 3D printing); and a non-transitory computer-readable medium facilitating the same. For example, a controller that regulates a deformation of at least a portion of the 3D object. The control may be in situ control. The control may be real-time control during the 3D printing process. For example, the control may be during a physical-attribute pulse. The present disclosure provides various methods, apparatuses, systems and software for estimating the fundamental length scale of a melt pool, and for various tools that increase the accuracy of the 3D printing.

Method(s) include projecting a support toolpath into a current layer of a model, removing any pieces within an expanded version of a current boundary of the model, generating a support toolpath for the current layer, adding a height increase to portion(s) of model toolpath(s) for the higher layer of the model that overlie the support toolpath generated for the current layer, connecting the support toolpath and the projected support toolpath to form a connected support toolpath, overlaying the connected support toolpath with a next boundary of the model in a lower layer of the model, adding a height increase to portion(s) of the connected support toolpath that fall within the next boundary of the model in the lower layer of the model, and repeating the process through layers of the model to form support toolpaths for support walls for the object to be manufactured by the extrusion printer.

A method for manufacturing a part by additive manufacturing, the part to be manufactured including at least one portion to be held forming an angle of less than 45° with respect to a building direction of the part to be manufactured, the portion to be held having a first lateral surface and a second lateral surface opposite each other, the method comprising the steps of: providing a digital model of the part to be manufactured, adding to the digital model at least one holding element positioned on one side of the portion to be held, so as to be in contact with said first lateral surface or said second lateral surface.

The invention relates to a plausibility checking method for rapid prototyping devices, in particular for stereolithography devices. In this connection, input data (14) is checked which is present particularly in the form of graphics data and of which every file renders a layer. Every layer comprises a plurality of pixels. The component to be printed in the respective layer is produced based on output data by the rapid prototyping device. The input data of two consecutive layers is checked and the sum of all pixels to be exposed is determined for every layer. A signal (22) is output in particular as a warning signal (26) when the pixel sum of a following layer is larger than in the previous layer by a predetermined factor.

A method and apparatus for manufacturing a part. The part is designed using a CAD system to generate a CAD part model of the part. Features of the part are identified from the CAD part model of the part. A parametric specification of the part is generated using the features of the part. The parametric specification of the part is saved as a parametric part model. The parametric part model is used to fabricate the part.

A system comprising a scanner to scan the airman or soldier (subject), a processor to receive, from the scanner, a non-manifold three-dimensional (3D) digital surface model (DSM) scan data representative of the subject, and a computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) device. The processor recognizes anatomical features on the 3D surface model including the cephalic (head) region of the scanned subject; stores each sub region defined by anatomical features as a non-manifold 3D surface model; creates a surface offset from the DSM sub region; creates a closed volume within and between the DSM sub region and the offset surface representative of a solid 3D pilot flight equipment; and causes a computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) device to manufacture the solid 3D pilot flight equipment.

A method for optimizing manufacturing data in a subtractive manufacturing system includes obtaining a model of and tolerance requirements for an object to be manufactured and performing measurements on the manufacturing system in a static condition. The method further includes simulating a manufacturing process in the manufacturing system using the obtained static information to obtain runtime information, determining which manufacturing data is responsible for producing each feature of the manufactured object, simulating manufacturing of the object, and comparing the simulated finished product of the object with the three-dimensional model of the object, detecting a deviation between the simulated finished product and the obtained tolerance requirements included in the model, and based on the detected deviation and the determination of which manufacturing data is responsible for producing each feature, optimizing the manufacturing data such that an object manufactured based on the optimized manufacturing data complies with the obtained tolerance requirements.

Model data is obtained, defining parts to be generated by a three-dimensional printer. A sprue is determined to connect the parts, and a label is automatically generated on the sprue which identifies the parts connected to the sprue. Modified model data is generated representing the parts and the sprue.

A method of designing and manufacturing a replica composite object based on an original object. The method identifies the structure and physical properties of an original object. Base materials, bodies, and structural templates, each of which includes associated physical properties, are utilized to generate a 3-dimensional model. The 3-dimensional model is discretized and tested to determine if the selected combination of base materials and bodies have physical properties that substantially equal the physical properties of the original object. If the physical properties do not equate, the 3-dimensional model is optimized by adjusting the combination of base materials, bodies, and structural templates. When the difference between the measured physical properties of the 3-dimensional model and the identified physical properties of the original object is less than a tolerance value, the method instructs an additive manufacturing system to generate a replica composite object based on the original object.