Fortius Metals, a sister company of Elementum 3D, has launched a collaborative project with DEEP Manufacturing to demonstrate industrial-scale multi-material Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing (WAAM). The initiative will leverage DEEP Manufacturing’s advanced WAAM platform to produce a highly complex metal cylinder composed of multiple alloys, manufactured as a single continuous component using several synchronized robotic systems.

In today’s competitive manufacturing landscape, metal additive manufacturing (AM) offers companies a powerful way to improve performance, reduce lead times, and differentiate their products. At Elementum 3D, our advantage comes from more than 50 years of combined powder metallurgy expertise and breakthrough material science innovations that have enabled the commercialization of high-performance alloys previously considered unprintable.

At its core, our patented Reactive Additive Manufacturing (RAM) technology solves the heat tearing and stress cracking challenges that have traditionally limited the additive manufacturing of widely used aluminum alloys such as 6061 and 7050. Combining RAM’s ability to alter the solidification process by creating stronger, equiaxed grain structures with optimized parameter sets, unlocks the full economic potential of additive manufacturing. Printability and consistency, which includes surface finish, and print speed, are improved to enable exceptional mechanical performance and manufacturing reliability compared with conventional non-RAM materials.

Surface Finish

Low “as-printed” surface roughness offers significant manufacturing advantages, including reduced or eliminated post-processing steps, improved coating capability, increased flowability, reduced contamination buildup, and lower overall production costs. Elementum 3D’s optimized laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) build parameters produce surface finishes that rival the best in the additive manufacturing industry — making AM a more attractive alternative to traditional manufacturing processes.

Through extensive materials and process development, the Elementum 3D team achieved excellent surface roughness on upward-facing surface angles ranging from 90° to 40°, while maintaining high print speeds. Improved surface finish reduces post-processing expenses, enhances coating performance, and minimizes contaminant buildup.

On April 25, Elementum 3D officially consolidated its headquarters to a single location at 2700 S. Main St., Erie, Colorado. The nearly 11,000-square-foot facility had previously been used as a secondary site for manufacturing, post-processing, and development of new commercial products and services.

“Elementum 3D has had a presence in Erie since 2014, and we are very excited to consolidate our operations into one location,” said Dr. Jacob Nuechterlein, President and Founder of Elementum 3D, Inc. “We are actively involving our colleagues in the transition process to develop a space that streamlines workflow, strengthens relationships, and provides the room we need to grow.”

Bringing together two Erie-based locations under one roof will expand opportunities for cross-team collaboration while fostering a culture of innovation and improving operational efficiency. The new corporate headquarters features a 30% increase in manufacturing workspace, providing the infrastructure needed to sustain current momentum and support continued growth across both U.S. and international markets.

“We believe it’s in the best strategic interest of the company to make this move, which supports our strategy to provide customers with the highest-performance materials in an efficient and repeatable manner,” Dr. Nuechterlein added.

This relocation reflects the evolving needs of Elementum 3D’s dynamic business and operations. It represents a key step in the company’s growth strategy—positioning it to better accommodate future expansion while advancing the adoption of additive manufacturing technologies.

The demand for complex, high-temperature parts made with refractory alloys is rapidly increasing across industrial sectors. Refractory metals such as rhenium (Re), tungsten (W), tantalum (Ta), niobium (Nb), molybdenum (Mo), and alloys thereof are widely used across biomedical, aerospace, space, electronics, and nuclear industries. These materials are valued for extreme high temperature capability, and selected refractories can also provide excellent corrosion resistance, electrical and thermal conductivity, high density, and radiation shielding and tolerance.

Leveraging Elementum 3D (E3D)’s 10+ years of additive manufacturing (AM) refractory expertise, we strive to inform and empower customers to innovate when developing mission-critical applications requiring refractory alloys, including rocket and advanced propulsion systems, industrial tooling, X-ray shielding, medical implants, energy production, and chemical processing equipment.

Advancement of E3D’s refractories include the execution of a Defense Advanced Research Project (DARPA) Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) to develop the additive manufacturing (AM) feedstock and process capability to print rhenium using laser powder bed fusion (PBF-LB). This work included property collection at high temperatures and application performance testing. The project also demonstrated greatly reduced lead times for rhenium component production compared to legacy manufacturing methods.

Beyond rhenium, E3D is developing refractory alloys with improved performance, crack-free printability, and reduced costs. Alloys of tantalum (e.g. Ta-W) and tungsten (e.g W-Re) are seeing increasing interest as high performance metals are needed for space and nuclear energy applications demanding extreme temperatures and radiation resistance. The team is also developing in-situ deoxidization and inoculation strategies to mitigate microcracking in susceptible refractory alloys. Elementum 3D is also working on next generation niobium alloys that can outperform C-103 while reducing costs by eliminating the need for expensive hafnium. Increasing market prices for refractory metals further reinforces the need for lean additive manufacturing capability to maximize usage efficiency of these high-performance materials.

To learn more about our printable refractory alloys, contact at sales@elementum3d.com or visit www.elementum3d.com.

PermiAM is a patented technology for laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) additive manufacturing (AM) which enables printing of porous material with controllable permeability together with fully dense material.

The process allows for easy integration of precise permeability for control of pressure and flow for applications such as fuel injection, rocket and combustion engines, wicking heat pipes, transpiration cooling, filtration, catalysis, and more. The methods allow for process-based generation of the permeable regions from a simple CAD model without the need for complex CAD modeled microporous structures.

The technology was initially matured by Elementum 3D and Masten Space Systems (now Astrobotic) with support from a NASA SBIR program. The ability to integrate regions with controlled permeability with solid material in printed parts can improve performance and reliability while simplifying manufacturing for reducing cost and time.

The innovative process introduces the capability to engineer materials with open porosity of a smaller scale than is traditionally possible in CAD-based AM methods. The technology is applicable for printable metal alloys including aluminums, superalloys, coppers, steels, and refractories. Porosity can be graded across the geometry enabling precisely tuned permeability across a region.

Elementum 3D is pleased to announce the successful completion of the company’s surveillance audit of our AS9100D certification! 

Completion of this annual audit helps to ensure that Elementum 3D’s extensive Quality Management System will continue to meet the rigorous requirements of the certification standards and remain effective during the audit cycle. Achievement of this annual surveillance audit is part of the ongoing process of AS9100D certification, where the second and third years of the cycle are surveillance audits, followed by a full recertification at the end of the three-year cycle.

The Aerospace Quality Management System AS9100D certification provides customers from a range of industries with the highest assurance about the systems and processes in place to ensure Elementum 3D will meet their requirements.