Royal Netherlands Air Force: Reducing maintenance time with 3D printing

 Their fleet contains a wide range of helicopters, fighter jets, and large cargo planes. These aircraft have many unique, custom-made parts which are difficult to work on with off-the-shelf tools. That’s why the Royal Netherlands Air Force started printing custom-made tools with Ultimaker 3D printers. 
 
Performing maintenance on a complex and customized aircraft can be a huge challenge: there are a lot of uncommon parts and systems to work with. 3D printing makes the work simpler. It offers a way to affordably create tools that fit these specific applications in hours. This is something that the Royal Netherlands Air Force quickly realized. Instead of outsourcing, they’ve printed numerous parts on Ultimaker in the past two years, saving time and money. 
 

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