Manufacturing, as an industry, has seen a number of distinct eras of change, innovation, and advancement, as evidenced by the shorthand we use to describe the current period: Industry 4.0, the 4th Industrial Revolution, and so on. Throughout the history of manufacturing, innovation has spurred advances in efficiency, quality, and productivity. One of those technologies in particular is 3D printing. This innovation has made an impact at nearly every stage of the product development and production cycle, from design and prototyping through to manufacture and maintenance. As 3D printing technology has become more adopted and accessible, manufacturers have been able to prototype and iterate upon designs much more quickly, with many now carrying out these steps in house, speeding up development and reducing costs. In addition, 3D printing can create production-quality replacement parts, helping manufacturers overcome supply chain shortages and shipping delays while enabling the creation of nearly any type of component through reverse engineering – even those for older equipment that may no longer be supported by the OEM. This type of innovation is what allows for organizations to better work through unexpected equipment downtime that could’ve otherwise felt impossible to solve. For more information on the types of technologies and maintenance strategies assisting manufacturing organizations, please see the resource highlighted alongside this post.
Low Or No Maintenance Industrial Machinery provided by FLEXIM, the premier leader in gas flow measurement devices
