The latest laser technology at the CSIR's National Laser Centre

14th March 2013

By: Creamer Media Reporter

  

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From Creamer Media in Johannesburg, this is the Real Economy Report. Engineering News recently took a tour of the Centre for Scientific and Industrial Research’s National Laser Centre to catch up on the latest laser technology and developments in the industry. Samantha Moolman has the story.

Samantha Moolman:
For more than a decade, the National Laser Centre has been introducing the competitive advantage of advanced laser materials processing to the local manufacturing industry.

We sat down with the NLC’s laser-enabled manufacturing manager Hansie Pretorius to find out more.

NLC manufacturing manager Hansie Pretorius:
The National Laser Centre was formed in 2000 and the main purpose and mandate of the centre is to introduce laser technology to industry.

We’ve got highly expensive machines not always available to industry and too costly for them to purchase. We’ve set up a facility for industry to use our laser systems to perform production work and research work on their components.

Samantha Moolman:
The NLC hopes to start production on its new additive manufacturing system, which was recently acquired from US-based additive manufacturing specialist Optomec, sometime this year.

Hansie Pretorius:
The Optomec LENS system is a laser-engineered net shaping system, which is used to form components from scratch using a CAD (computer-aided design) 3D drawing.

The main advantage of these components is that one can manufacture very intricate components which are very difficult to cast or machine, using this system.

Using the system you can actually grow a 3D component from scratch using a powder. You can use different powders including stainless steel, titanium, copper – any component you can build using a metal-based powder at the CSIR.

The big advantage is mainly that you can do very intricate designs. For example, if you have an intricate cooling circuit inside a component you can build the component from there.

The other advantage is that, if it’s low-volume components you can save a lot of time and cost, where in the past a component first had to be cast. Now you can build a component from scratch using the machine.

One of the examples given to us was that, in the normal process, to manufacture a certain component it would take eight months. Using a LENS system, you can do that in two weeks.

Shannon de Ryhove:
Other news making headlines this week: The latest OECD report on South Africa finds education to be a ‘critical problem’; a World Bank economist urges South Africa to focus on savings and investment to bolster growth; and Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan seeks a ‘delicate’ balance as the OECD calls for steeper power hikes.

The latest Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development report found education to be a “critical problem”, where South Africa’s educational outcomes are “poor on average and extremely uneven”, which is aggravating the excess supply of unskilled labour and worsening income inequality.

Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development secretary-general Angel Gurria

World Bank chief economist Kaushik Basu, who took up the position in October, has urged South Africa to prioritise policies that encouraged higher savings and investment levels, which he argues are key to creating the platform for higher rates of economic growth.

World Bank chief economist Kaushik Basu

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan openly disagreed with the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development’s assessment that, notwithstanding a doubling in electricity prices since 2008, South Africa tariffs remained too low and needed to rise “substantially” to cover costs, reduce emissions and eliminate implicit coal subsidies.

Finance Minister Pravin Gordhan

That’s Creamer Media’s Real Economy Report. Join us again next week for more news and insight into South Africa’s real economy.

Edited by Shannon de Ryhove
Contributing Editor

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