【Waterjet Processing】Is Waterjet Cutting the Next Technological Revolution? A New Dawn for the Medical Device Manufacturing Industry!
Today's medical device industry faces constantly evolving challenges. With increasing development cost pressures and the difficulty of maintaining quality, medical device manufacturers are seeking new technologies to streamline production processes while reducing costs. To address these upcoming challenges, the solution lies in a new wave of desktop manufacturing technologies, such as a waterjet cutter. Manufacturers can rapidly prototype and validate concepts, provide localized and customized processing, utilize specialized materials, and create tools to maintain high-volume production lines.
Accelerate Prototyping Process
Prototyping is an iterative process that involves design, construction, testing, and evaluation. This is a crucial process in creating medical devices. When prototyping orthopedic implants, product design engineers need to create test samples and fully functional prototypes to ensure the performance of the implant prototype. Due to the lack of industrial manufacturing tools and machines required to cut certain metals, design engineers often need to outsource special component customization. However, the outsourcing process can take weeks, creating a lengthy bottleneck that negatively impacts the prototyping stage. Desktop waterjet cutters like WAZER enable engineers to create fully functional implant prototypes in-house. Tests can be performed faster than outsourcing, and necessary adjustments can be made concurrently.
Waterjet cutting allows engineers to prototype and test using any material, including the materials used in the final implant, enabling engineers to conduct more accurate evaluations with the same materials. Orthopedic implants made of titanium or stainless steel can be cut with a waterjet, but not with plasma or laser cutters, which can weaken the material or cutting edge.
Medical device companies need to produce components and participate in clinical trials in a short amount of time. Traditional manufacturing methods like sheet metal stamping are costly, have long lead times, and are very inefficient. Desktop CNC waterjet cutters provide medical product design engineers with an affordable solution for small-batch prototyping. A desktop CNC waterjet cutter can be placed almost anywhere in an engineering workshop. The WAZER waterjet enables engineers to make adjustments and iterations based on prototype testing, thereby reducing costs and waiting times.
Additive and Subtractive Manufacturing for Prototyping
Today's prototyping requires both desktop subtractive and additive manufacturing machinery to achieve the broadest range of in-house prototyping capabilities. Desktop 3D printers use resin materials to produce parts, while small waterjets like WAZER cut prototype parts from metals and specialized materials. With the ability to perform rapid, continuous iterations, medical device design engineers can develop at a lower cost, making changes early in the development process to reduce design risks.
Prototyping is an iterative process that involves design, construction, testing, and evaluation. This is a crucial process in creating medical devices. When prototyping orthopedic implants, product design engineers need to create test samples and fully functional prototypes to ensure the performance of the implant prototype. Due to the lack of industrial manufacturing tools and machines required to cut certain metals, design engineers often need to outsource special component customization. However, the outsourcing process can take weeks, creating a lengthy bottleneck that negatively impacts the prototyping stage. Desktop waterjet cutters like WAZER enable engineers to create fully functional implant prototypes in-house. Tests can be performed faster than outsourcing, and necessary adjustments can be made concurrently.
Waterjet cutting allows engineers to prototype and test using any material, including the materials used in the final implant, enabling engineers to conduct more accurate evaluations with the same materials. Orthopedic implants made of titanium or stainless steel can be cut with a waterjet, but not with plasma or laser cutters, which can weaken the material or cutting edge.
Medical device companies need to produce components and participate in clinical trials in a short amount of time. Traditional manufacturing methods like sheet metal stamping are costly, have long lead times, and are very inefficient. Desktop CNC waterjet cutters provide medical product design engineers with an affordable solution for small-batch prototyping. A desktop CNC waterjet cutter can be placed almost anywhere in an engineering workshop. The WAZER waterjet enables engineers to make adjustments and iterations based on prototype testing, thereby reducing costs and waiting times.
Additive and Subtractive Manufacturing for Prototyping
Today's prototyping requires both desktop subtractive and additive manufacturing machinery to achieve the broadest range of in-house prototyping capabilities. Desktop 3D printers use resin materials to produce parts, while small waterjets like WAZER cut prototype parts from metals and specialized materials. With the ability to perform rapid, continuous iterations, medical device design engineers can develop at a lower cost, making changes early in the development process to reduce design risks.
Unique Materials for Specific Treatment Tools
Desktop 3D printers and waterjet cutters enable great innovation in healthcare while providing localized and customized treatments. Hospitals, clinics, and rehabilitation centers are using desktop equipment, and currently, 99% of US hospitals are equipped with desktop 3D printers. By integrating desktop 3D printers into hospitals and laboratories, technicians can easily operate software to produce:
．Anatomical models for pre-surgical planning
．Surgical guides customized based on body scans
．Parts designed to match body scans
．Dentures obtained directly from intraoral scans
．Customized surgical instruments based on surgeons' specifications
As the procedures and technologies used in healthcare evolve and advance, so too must the equipment that delivers these treatments. Desktop 3D printers and waterjet cutters enable hospitals and laboratories to reduce the time required by traditional methods and create one-off parts, all without requiring a large team to operate the equipment.
Special Materials for Desktop Equipment
The specialized materials used in medical devices today challenge manufacturers to find the right tools to process them. For biocompatible, sterilization-resistant, and X-ray opaque plastics such as PEEK (polyether ether ketone), PPSU (polyphenylsulfone), PSU (polysulfone), and POM (polyoxymethylene), there are often no readily available equipment options to handle these materials.
Today, desktop manufacturing machinery can overcome these difficulties. Desktop waterjet cutters are ideal for cutting special plastics and metal sheets with high strength-to-weight ratios, such as titanium, for orthotics, prosthetics, and more. Respiratory connectors and adapters require special plastics. Due to technological limitations, these materials are not compatible with desktop 3D printers.
Continuous Production Runs
High-volume manufacturing requires precision tools and fixtures to guide and control mass production. Tools need to be updated whenever parts or machines change. Outsourcing tools can take weeks or months, increasing time, cost, and risk of error. Without the right tools, production is forced to stop. For high-volume manufacturers, a week of downtime is a huge cost. Desktop waterjet cutters can manufacture tools and fixtures in-house, reducing manufacturing costs and downtime while accelerating time to market. Suppose a medical device manufacturer has molds for 60 industrial pieces of equipment that need to be replaced. A desktop waterjet cutter can produce new molds in-house faster than outsourcing.
Growing innovation and competitive pressure, along with high-volume production requirements, compel medical device manufacturers to rapidly innovate and prototype. Desktop manufacturing equipment enables companies to accelerate the design phase and reduce development risks, and manufacture medical devices in-house. These tools are crucial drivers of medical device development and production because the equipment has a smaller footprint, is affordable, and technicians can quickly learn and operate it in-house. Affordable desktop waterjet cutters, along with continuously innovating 3D printers, are constantly helping medical device manufacturers meet new future challenges.
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