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Everything You Need To Know About Cold Metal Fusion

Today, the manufacturing industry is increasingly moving towards metal additive manufacturing solutions. However, these machines are often expensive for companies entering this field. Consequently, the cost of metal 3D printers can be a major barrier to market entry. Luckily, the

Cold Metal Fusion
3Dnatives

Today, the manufacturing industry is increasingly moving towards metal additive manufacturing solutions. However, these machines are often expensive for companies entering this field. Consequently, the cost of metal 3D printers can be a major barrier to market entry. Luckily, there is a promising trend emerging in the development of polymer powder-based additive manufacturing solutions, which are becoming increasingly affordable. Among these, Selective laser sintering (SLS) technology stands out as a compelling alternative for producing final polymer parts across a wide range of applications. But what if the advantages of metal 3D printing could be combined with the low-cost solutions of SLS manufacturing? This is now possible thanks to Cold Metal Fusion technology.

Developed by German company Headmade Materials, Cold Metal Fusion (CMF) 3D printing is a method of indirect metal fabrication. Specifically, the company focuses on the development of powder materials compatible with this system, with no immediate plans for manufacturing 3D printers—at least for the time being. These materials are comprised of metal particles encased within a polymer binder layer. Based on a powder bed process, the CMF system enables those with SLS machines to create final metal parts. Let’s delve deeper into the properties of this technology and explore the advancements it introduces to the additive manufacturing industry.

A titanium part 3D printed using Cold Metal Fusion technology.

How the Cold Metal Fusion Process Works

As with any 3D printing process, it all starts with designing the models in CAD software. An important aspect to remember when designing parts for CMF (and in general for any sintering-based process) is that parts can shrink during fabrication. In the CMF process, parts achieve a high density, minimizing the shrinkage that occurs during sintering. When utilizing metal powder as a raw material, parts may uniformly shrink in all directions (XYZ) by approximately 14%. These few millimeters of shrinkage must, therefore, be taken into account. The digital file is then sent to the slicer to segment the part and define the manufacturing parameters.