WHY THE HYPE?
QUICK TURNAROUND
The 3D-printed On-Demand Small Unmanned Aircraft System is a new concept whereby Soldiers add requirements to mission plan- ning software, and the system selects the optimal configuration for an aerial vehicle. It can be printed and delivered within 24 hours. This kind of quick custom design and build is one of the great promises of addi- tive manufacturing. (U.S. Army photo)
at thermal, mechanical and electrical performance of high-power electronics packaging.”
SAME TECHNOLOGY, DIFFERENT RESULT Part of the potentially endless advan- tages of additive is the capability to easily produce dead-simple to ragingly complex objects. So, while we would seem to be a long way from printing a new human heart, the Rapid Equipping Force’s Expe- ditionary Lab (Ex Lab) in Afghanistan recently designed and printed a special- ized tourniquet component to help stanch blood flow from a Soldier’s groin wound in the field.
Tis junctional tourniquet is just one of the hundreds of projects that the Ex Lab, which is essentially an engineering and fabrication facility in a box—in this case, a 20-foot shipping container—has created as the result of Soldiers’ requests. “Among other fabrication processes, we use four additive manufacturing machines, which we run 24 hours a day, and what we’re
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building is going right into the hands of U.S. Soldiers. Tat’s a small piece of where the Army is with additive manu- facturing in the deployed environment,” said Angel Cruz, the U.S. Army Research, Development and Engineering Command (RDECOM) project lead, REF Ex Lab, in an interview.
“Everything that Ex Labs build is custom. A Soldier comes in with a mission-capability shortfall that can be solved by a materiel solution, and then the engineers we have downrange brainstorm with the Solider and build the custom solution on-site. If we can’t build it there, we have it built somewhere within RDECOM and ship it forward. Ex Labs provide a truly unique and powerful capability accessed directly by deployed Soldiers.”
Tere are probably too many advantages to the Ex Lab approach to list, but at the very top is the capacity to get unique equipment that does not currently exist to Soldiers very quickly. The Soldier brings an idea or a problem directly to
Army AL&T Magazine January-March 2019
the engineers, and they collaborate on a design that can be hammered out right then and there. Te junctional tourniquet originated with special operations medics, Cruz said. Tey found it very difficult to stanch blood flow with the standard tour- niquet in groin wounds. Tese medics were using chewing tobacco containers and applying them with ace bandages.
Te medics brought the tobacco container method to the Ex Lab engineers and within hours had several printed proto- types to test and select the best one. And that’s just one of the many solutions that’s come out of the Ex Lab.
Similarly, according to Tim Phillis, the U.S. Army Armament Research, Devel- opment and Engineering Center’s Rapid Fabrication via Additive Manufacturing on the Battlefield (R-FAB) is a factory in a box. “R-FAB only has additive with 3D scanning capability, as well. It’s only polymer printing because that technol- ogy and those pieces of equipment were the ones we felt were the most ready for
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