MSAM helps SME develop a custom surgical tool prototype for hip replacement surgery

Partner

Intellijoint Surgical, an SME that develops surgical tools in Waterloo, ON, and Renishaw, a global leader in engineering and advanced manufacturing.

Challenge

• Metal additive manufacturing (AM) can create customized components with lightweight materials and complex geometries not achievable with traditional manufacturing (e.g. CNC machining).
• However, AM limitations can include poor surface finish, geometric distortion and suboptimal mechanical properties.

Solution

• Researchers investigated commercially-viable hybrid manufacturing workflows to use CNC machining to refine features of AM components to meet precise requirements.
• A prototype was developed for an intraoperative measurement tool for hip replacement surgery.

Impact

• Demands for customized high-value, low-volume components in fields such as medical and aerospace are necessitating novel manufacturing methods.
• The results have lead to future work to refine AM design and CNC programing for hybrid manufacturing workflows.
• The project represents a successful collaboration in the advanced manufacturing sector between MSAM, an Ontario SME (Intellijoint Surgical) and a MNE (Renishaw).
• This project was featured at the COU Policy Discussion Series on Advanced Manufacturing: https://ontariosuniversities.ca/reports/advanced-manufacturing