A novel decision-making logic for hybrid manufacture of prismatic components based on existing parts

The on-going industrial trend towards high value sustainable manufacturing has led to the emergence of hybrid manufacturing processes. This new generation of processes combines the capabilities of a number of individual manufacturing processes on a single platform. Despite the fact that the drawbacks of individual processes have been significantly reduced, the application of hybrid technology has always been constrained by the capabilities of their constituent processes, in particular the capability to utilise various raw materials in terms of shape and size. This paper introduces a novel concept of hybrid process, which consists of combining additive, subtractive and inspection processes. A feature-based decision-making logic is developed, enabling the hybrid process to reuse existing parts/legacy products. An existing part is first measured for obtaining its geometrical information. Feasible manufacturing strategies are provided and then additive, subtractive and inspection processes are utilised interchangeably to add and/or remove material, transforming the existing part into the final part. This indicates that the iAtractive process is not restricted by raw material geometries. Three identical test parts were manufactured from three existing different shaped parts, demonstrating the efficacy of the proposed hybrid process and the decision-making logic in material reuse. New features can be added onto the existing parts and existing features can be removed or further manufactured, giving these parts additional lives, new uses and increased functionality.