How to Combine Additive and Subtractive Manufacturing in Production? Experts Give Their Advice!

In recent years, the combination of additive and subtractive manufacturing has gained in popularity, making a significant impact worldwide. Thanks to a number of technological advances, there are a wide variety of industries already benefiting from so-called “hybrid manufacturing” for the creation of final parts. Indeed, although there are differences between the two production methods, they can be used in a complementary way to get the most out of them. However, it is important to know exactly what these technologies consist of in order to be able to implement them in a company. To address this, we spoke to three experts from the manufacturing industry. They gave us their opinion and advice on how to implement additive and subtractive manufacturing optimally in the production chain.

First up is Peter Genovese, 3D printing applications engineer for SolidCAM Additive. He has been working with additive technologies for nearly a decade and draws on his professional experience to determine how additive technologies best fit into various manufacturing environments. Next, Elena Lopez works as head of the additive manufacturing department at Fraunhofer IWS. She is also an adjunct professor of additive manufacturing and is part of Women in 3D Printing as the Regional Director for Europe. Finally, Brian Kristaponis, is the General Manager of the Hybrid Division within Phillips, a leading provider of manufacturing solutions and new technologies for a wide variety of markets.

Characteristics of Additive and Subtractive Manufacturing

Before discussing how to implement hybrid production, it is important to understand the significant differences between the two methods. Additive manufacturing consists of layering material, layer by layer, until the desired part is created. Within the family of 3D printing technologies we can find: material extrusion, material jetting, binder jetting, vat photopolymerization, powder bed fusion, Directed Energy Deposition (DED) and sheet lamination. Meanwhile, subtractive manufacturing consists of the manufacturing of parts by extracting material from a block or larger part. These subtractive processes include CNC machining (milling, turning, drilling, boring, boring, grinding), laser cutting, electrical discharge machining and water jet cutting.