AM Craft
AM Craft has completed a Finnair project that saw the aviation supplier additively manufacture replacement flip-down monitors within the Passenger Service Units of Finnair's Airbus A320 fleet.
More than 300 of these components are being delivered to Finnair on a just-in-time basis, allowing the Finnish airline to procure the install-ready, airworthiness-certified parts as and when they are needed for 17 individual aircraft.
The installation campaign of the printed panels as a fleet-wide solution commenced in the fourth quarter of 2023 and has been progressing on schedule ever since.
AM Craft's services were obtained to handle the design, production and certification of the cabin components, with AM Craft using Stratasys FDM technology and the ULTEM 9085 filament to help optimise weight while still meeting all Finnair operational and airworthiness requirements. Because AM Craft holds an EASA 21G Production Organization Approval, the company can certify the airworthiness of the part they manufacture. Thus, Finnair was able to turn to them for end-to-end support, from project initiation through to delivering install-ready parts complete with Form 1 airworthiness certificates. Delivering the parts on a just-in-time basis also helps Finnair to minimise inventory and eliminates some of the cost associated with the traditional supply chain.
“This project is a great example of how well additive manufacturing fits within the aviation sector. As the average age of the commercial fleet continues to grow, there are many opportunities where it makes sense to redesign a part and produce only the quantity needed rather than try to leverage the long lead-times of the original source. With additive manufacturing, we can realise great low-volume, high-mix economics, and we can often reduce part count and weight in the process,” said Janis Jatnieks, AM Craft’s Chief Commercial Officer. “Without additive manufacturing, this could have been a much slower and more expensive project, but because AM Craft can manage the entire project to design and certify a printable solution, Finnair saved time and money, and also significantly reducing the weight of these parts.
“Now that this part has been developed, certified, and added to our digital catalogue, it will be available to Finnair, or any other airline that requires this solution for an A320, again at any point in the future. And because of our network of approved production facilities, if the next part is needed in Dubai or Singapore, we can produce it locally and have it ready to install wherever it is need without stocking or shipping.”
Finnair’s Totti Pekonen, Manager Cabin & Payload Engineering, added: “The parts we received from AM Craft were of high quality and delivered on time. Though they were a new supplier for us on the PSU project, we have been very impressed by their expertise and professionalism and look forward to continuing to work with them.”
