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Comment by mezeek | Hacker News Reader

Additive layer manufacturing has major benefits... unless you want to have a super-high production rate like Raptor. So it's a positive for them.

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Like normal 3D printers, they are slow, but the benefits are, that you can change the design quickly and improve it - and then in the end you can invest into optimizing production with a different manufacturing process.

(But that is of course hard, to get the same results)

Pretty hard to reproduce the exact same design coming out of a 3D printer with other methods. Unless you put real effort into making sure the part is build-able with other methods you could run into real problems.

I considered putting it as both a positive and negative, but I consider it overall a negative until the technology is proven to be as strong and reliable as traditional manufacturing techniques - not to mention faster and less expensive.

I also wonder about durability of materials. Will the engine last shorter or longer due to being additive-layer-manufactured, all else being equal? Compared, say, to the Raptor?

Today there are lots of different metals that can be 3D printed. Some have very high capability. Are there any that compete with custom forged parts used in Raptor? I don't know, I don't think people outside of industry really have this information.

We know that SpaceX has its own material science team developing its own alloys specifically for their use case. This material doesn't seem to be designed for 3D printing (as far as we know).

What if SpaceX had instead invested that money in superior material for 3D printing instead?

Maybe somebody who is doing their PhD on material science in rocketry can comment.

I would also consider that engine likely has other places that would be more likely to put a limiting factor on durability so maybe it doesn't matter so much.

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