The manufacturing startup Divergent 3D is looking to expand the use of 3D printing technology to reduce the cost of designing, producing, and fully assembling vehicles while going green at the same time.
Kevin Czinger, CEO and lead inventor at the company, declared that the use of printing will slash production expenses for major automotive companies and create more efficient vehicles.
"By doing what we're doing, we're massively lowering that cost of entry and giving people, say like AWS [Amazon Web Services] gives people access to tools and processing power and storage, we're doing the same thing with design tools and production and assembly capacity," he told Cheddar.
The technology is able to convert powdered metal into car frames, suspensions, and subframes by heating it to nearly the melting point, then shaping it with a low powered laser.
The company created the world's first 3D printed car, the Divergent Blade, back in 2015 and this year, the Czinger 21c made its debut. Beyond lowering costs, the draw for 3D printing automobiles, according to the CEO, is the ability to produce various types of structures simultaneously as well as having a lower carbon footprint.
"If you really look at the environment from a global scale, it's not about tailpipe exhaust, it's about the growing of the global population and it's becoming more and more developed so it's consuming more products," Czinger said.
When it comes to reducing emissions, the automotive industry has to find innovative ways to make designs more efficient so fewer resources are used up, he added.
"The single most important thing that can be done for the environment going forward is to dematerialize structures, make them more efficient, and close loop the materials so you're not constantly mining and processing new materials with all the destruction to the environment that entails," Czinger explained.
Divergent 3D is banking on expanding among respected manufacturers to bring the technology into full mainstream use.
"What I believe is when people see that three of the top five global automakers are adopting this technology and this production platform, that is going to be the beacon signal that this is a true validated technology and that will accelerate the adoption of that technology," Czinger said.
Joe Cecela, Dream Exchange CEO, explains how they are aiming to form the first minority-controlled company to operate an exchange in U.S. history. Watch!
A Michigan judge is putting sponges in the hands of shoplifters and ordering them to wash cars in a Walmart parking lot when spring weather arrives. Genesee County Judge Jeffrey Clothier hopes the unusual form of community service discourages people from stealing from Walmart. The judge also wants to reward shoppers with free car washes. Clothier says he began ordering “Walmart wash” sentences this week for shoplifting at the store in Grand Blanc Township. He believes 75 to 100 people eventually will be ordered to wash cars this spring. Clothier says he will be washing cars alongside them when the time comes.
The State Department had been in talks with Elon Musk’s Tesla company to buy armored electric vehicles, but the plans have been put on hold by the Trump administration after reports emerged about a potential $400 million purchase. A State Department spokesperson said the electric car company owned by Musk was the only one that expressed interest back in May 2024. The deal with Tesla was only in its planning phases but it was forecast to be the largest contract of the year. It shows how some of his wealth has come and was still expected to come from taxpayers.
At 100 years old, the Goodyear Blimp is an ageless star in the sky. The 246-foot-long airship will be in the background of the Daytona 500 — flying roughly 1,500 feet above Daytona International Speedway, actually — to celebrate its greatest anniversary tour. Even though remote camera technologies are improving regularly and changing the landscape of aerial footage, the blimp continues to carve out a niche. At Daytona, with the usual 40-car field racing around a 2½-mile superspeedway, views from the blimp aptly provide the scope of the event.
You'll just have to wait for interest rates (and prices) to go down. Plus, this deal's a steel, the big carmaker wedding is off, and bribery is back, baby!
It’s a chicken-and-egg problem: Restaurants are struggling with record-high U.S. egg prices, but their omelets, scrambles and huevos rancheros may be part of the problem. Breakfast is booming at U.S. eateries. First Watch, a restaurant chain that serves breakfast, brunch and lunch, nearly quadrupled its locations over the past decade to 570. Fast-food chains like Starbucks and Wendy's added more egg-filled breakfast items. In normal times, egg producers could meet the demand. But a bird flu outbreak that has forced them to slaughter their flocks is making supplies scarcer and pushing up prices. Some restaurants like Waffle House have added a surcharge to offset their costs.
William Falcon, CEO and Founder of Lightning AI, discusses the ongoing feud between Elon Musk and Sam Altman, and how everyday people can use AI in their lives.
