3D Printed Welding Fixtures for use with prototype or low volume manufacturing applications have become a reality in recent years. This is due to advances in the types of materials that are printable along with the machines that run them coming down in cost and increasing in speed. The reason we are seeing metal fabrication shops starting to use 3D printed details on there weld fixtures are the following:
- Build Speed: Whether its 1 or 50 details for the fixture 3D printing is generally a faster method of getting these parts compared to CNC machined or fabricated metal components.
- Design Freedom: 3D Printed Welding Fixture details can be designed to have all the needed complexity to allow for easy set up, alignment, clamping, and clearances for welding that can sometimes be challenging to achieve with traditional fixture manufacturing methods.
- Anti Weld Spatter: Due to the parts being plastic it is much harder for weld spatter to stick to them. When coupled with a Cerakote coating (which is good up to 1800F and is ceramic based) the instances of spatter sticking to them is reduced even more.
- Light weight: simple table top fixtures can become quite heavy when constructed entirely out of steel, this can make them tiring to work with or cause ergonomic issues for the welder. Nylon is 1/4 the weight of steel, this greatly reduces the weight of 3D Printed Welding Fixtures.
The best process / materials we have found for these 3D printed details is the HP MJF printer coupled with either Nylon 12 or Nylon 12 with 40% glass in it. This was the machine used to produce the parts you see in the example below:
Thank you to Ludlow Manufacturing for helping out with this video.
It is important to note that these 3D printed details will not hold up as long as traditional steel details so they should not be considered for use on long running production fixtures. Instead, they are very well suited for things like prototype, low volume production, and service part production.