Dana Corporation, a Tier One automotive supplier, assumes responsibility for designing components to meet its customers’ requirements. Validating these designs with prototypes from conventional machining and casting methods required weeks or months and tens of thousands of dollars. The time and expense limited Dana’s use of prototypes.

“By the time a conventional prototype can be made, it’s possible to invest large amounts of time and money in a design that doesn’t work,” says Bruce Vanisacker, designer for Dana’s Rapid Prototyping/CAE Services. Contrasting fused deposition modeling (FDM®) to conventional methods, he says, “FDM enables us to produce accurate and specialized functional rapid prototypes in a
few days. A physical part gives everyone the opportunity to hold and touch and feel the part and determine exactly where we stand.”