French Navy Validates Meltio’s DED additive manufacturing technology
Spanish company Meltio, which specializes in Wire-Laser Directed Energy Deposition (DED), has added another high-profile defense user to its adoption base. The French Navy has reportedly validated the company’s additive manufacturing technology for use during military maneuvers, making it the third national army to validate the technology, following the Spanish Army (which uses the metal AM process for manufacturing and repair operations) and the US Navy, which last year installed a Meltio system on a US Navy ship.
The validation by the French Navy follows a series of experiments which were carried out last May, in which Meltio’s metal 3D printing technology was used in military maneuvers. Prior to the experiments, the French Navy had also conducted a number of adoption tests for the metal AM process. It goes without saying that these were a success. With the validation of the metal AM technology complete, the next steps for the French Navy will involve using Meltio’s solution in more experiments and eventually installing metal AM systems onboard Navy ships.
As part of the validation process, a Meltio wire-laser DED system was installed at the French Navy’s logistics department in Toulon and in May 2024 was used in the “Ursa Minor” exercise, which the company describes as “a high-intensity operational maintenance naval exercise organized by the Fleet Support Service (FSS)”. In the experiment, the 3D printer was used in a repair exercise for the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier, which was ultimately a success. Currently, the Meltio system is still installed in Toulon and is taking manufacturing and repair requests from the aircraft carrier.
“Last May, we conducted the Ursa Minor 2024 offshore exercise, in which the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier requested us from its internal naval engineering center to repair metal parts,” explained Jean-Marc Quenez, Director of Innovation and Additive Manufacturing at the FSS of the French Ministry of Defense. “It was at that moment that we turned to Meltio’s metal 3D printing technology. Let’s say that this machine performs a function, for the moment experimental from land and in tests, of land-sea tele-assistance. The exercise was a success. We plan to carry out more exercises of this type over the coming months and in the future, the French Army is considering incorporating this type of metal 3D printer on board.”
“The main objective of this transfer is to respond to the Navy ships that are sailing with their repair and manufacturing needs in different metallic materials, mainly stainless steels and Inconel, for which Meltio’s additive manufacturing system is very efficient in the result of the parts obtained,” he added. “We chose Meltio for this exercise because it allows us to repair existing metal parts and with this machine, we manufacture test parts with DED technology, not final parts that we then post-process and machine according to our needs. The Spanish brand’s metal 3D printer meets our expectations for reliability and is very easy to use by our engineers. We anticipate that this metal 3D printer will continue to be functional and will be part of our experimental additive manufacturing usage program that continues to evolve.”
Meltio’s technology, which is a DED-based process that uses wire as feedstock, has been of keen interest to the defense sector. As mentioned, Meltio’s AM technology is also in use aboard a US Navy ship, which is leveraging the technology to produce spare parts and repair existing metal equipment. Specifically, Meltio’s laser metal deposition technology has been integrated with a Haas TM-1 computer numerical control milling machine aboard the USS Bataan. The crew aboard the USS Bataan recently 3D printed its first part using the hybrid system. The part was a replacement metal plate for a ballast air compressor, which was successfully manufactured in just five days—significantly faster than if the crew had had to source the part through Navy supply channels while at sea.
