Application of Additive Manufacturing for Spare Parts in the Automotive Industry

Abstract

The injector yoke treated in this thesis, is one of the Volvo Group’s many spare parts. The yokes have earlier been produced in large scale and kept in stock at a central warehouse. Although Additive Manufacturing (AM) has largely been focused on fields where high manufacturing costs have been acceptable, it is now also believed to be a possible solution to avoid unnecessary large scale production and storage of these yokes. This thesis is a partnership between the Volvo Group, students from The Pennsylvania State University, and students from Chalmers University of Technology with the aim to investigate the possibilities of spare part manufacturing using AM. Provided with initial models, engineering drawings, and boundary conditions from the Volvo Group, initial research was conducted to optimize the current model for an additive manufacturing viewpoint. Different methods for additive manufacturing were examined and described in the report. Also, the economical aspects were analyzed. The result of the project was a design for an injector yoke, capable of replacing the original part with a volume reduction of 28.4%, and a recommendation to use DMLS by EOS for this kind of products. The conclusion that AM would not be a profitable manufacturing option at this time was drawn.