Originally Posted by andrew888  Hello everyone:
I want some small aluminum parts machined accurately but inexpensively from cad drawings. Do any you know of a good inexpensive online rapid prototyping service. Any help will be appreciated.
Andrew |
You will see that your post was somewhat of an oxymoron. Rapid prototypes are not "machined".
You said help would be appreciated, guess not so much. Since you are able to copy and paste from google, try reading about how many places have SLS capability, and then how many of them can use aluminum. I am not aware of any machines which can prototype parts using aluminum. I think it would be a good challenge to find someone who provides "rapid prototyping" of aluminum, not machining.
I doubt aluminum will work for SLS or EBM for a few reasons:
1) High thermal conductivity means it will melt a blob, not a finite spot. Ever TIG welded aluminum? Can you make a tiny weld pool? I can't.
2) Fine aluminum powder oxidizes quickly, meaning you will be working with aluminum oxide powder, probably not going to work.
3) Aluminum is really reflective, the same reasons its not cut with lasers would make me think it wouldn't be used in SLS either.
Mentioning "inexpensive" twice in two sentences means you want cheap. As previously stated, there is no such thing as cheap AND accurate. I am also not aware of any rapid prototyping service, online or otherwise, which is "inexpensive", not in my opinion anyway. It fills a need but its not cheap. I have seen some nice parts come from Redeye. No experience with any other online places.
Was that helpful?
Good Luck
Matt