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Additional Context
US Naval Sea Systems Command (NAVSEA) has approved the PBF process for 17-4PH stainless steel demonstrated by Naval Undersea Warfare Center (NUWC) Keyport, located in Washington state (one of ten Naval Warfare Centers located across the country). Keyport is the first Warfare Center to have received NAVSEA approval for a metal AM process, making this one of a handful of recent milestones embodying the Navy’s recent AM progress, and signaling imminent scale-up of the Navy’s demand for metal 3D printed parts.
Keyport validated its 17-4PH process on the EOS M290, one of the most widely used PBF systems in the world. The Navy has been working on this project for seven years, launching it as a Naval Innovative Science and Engineering (NISE) project and then transitioning it to a formal qualific