Home-3D Printed Battery Powers Predictive Maintenance in Steel Production
A collaborative initiative called 3Dstore, spearheaded by theCatalonia Institute for Energy Research(IREC) alongside theUniversitat Oberta de Catalunya(UOC) and steelmaking giantCELSA, has brought an unconventional solution to a persistent industrial challenge: unplanned machinery failures.
The consortium has engineered a monitoring system driven by a solid oxide battery fabricated through additive manufacturing, capable of detecting early warning signs of equipment malfunction in demanding factory settings.
Additional research partners, includingCIC energiGUNE, a Basque center specializing in electrochemical and thermal energy storage, and theUniversity of Castilla-La Mancha, contributed to the project’s development.
ICREA professor and IREC’s Head of Nanoionics and Fuel Cells, Albert Tarancón, framed the initiative’s broader ambition: “to monitor and digitalize strategic industries such as the steel sector.”
How the System Operates on the Factory Floor
At the core of the technology sits a solid oxide battery engineered to function under extreme temperatures while supplying energy to a low-consumption electronic unit with cellular connectivity. The battery’s 3D printed construction allows for precise material usage and geometry tailored to fit specific deployment needs, a flexibility that conventional manufacturing would struggle to match.
UOC led the design and field deployment of the electronic hardware, installing it directly on the shaft of a rolling mill at CELSA, a machine that flattens steel bars into structural profiles. The device continuously captures vibration and temperature data from the shaft, enabling engineers to anticipate failures before they occur.
Xavier Vilajosana, UOC’s Vice President for Research, Transfer and Entrepreneurship and an ICREA professor, noted that catching these faults in advance would prevent production halts of “at least four to eight hours,” with associated costs reaching “hundreds of thousands of euros” given the operational intensity of steel production.
Beyond Reliability: The Energy and Sustainability Angle
Source: 3D Printing Industry
