Shuppert's company finished this project for the U.S. Navy last month: They turned paper engineering drawings of a 900’ Sealift T-AKR 299 into a full 3D model.
By Ed Avis
Nearly four decades ago, Scott Shuppert, fresh out of college, got a job selling Autocad systems for a reseller in Springfield, Missouri. That eventually led to him opening his own business, which led to countless interesting CAD-related projects in the decades since.
Now Shuppert, owner of APDSP member CAD/CAM Services, has an idea that could help other APDSP members make money.
But first a little history.
CAD/CAM Services, located in Celina, Texas, was primarily an AutoCAD dealer for the first 10 or so years of its existence. Then about 18 years ago the Boy Scouts of America, to whom he had sold some AutoCAD workstations, approached Shuppert with a project – they wanted him to create digital topographic maps of all of their campgrounds so they could better understand the elevations, pathways, and other features. They figured he was an expert and could do the work better than they could do it themselves.
“So, a big light went off in my head,” Shuppert remembers. He realized that converting old paper documents into modern CAD files could be a more lucrative business than selling software. So, he put together a team to handle the Boy Scouts job, and eventually found other clients for that work. Some needed 3D scanning, too, so he added that to his portfolio.
“Then about six years ago we landed our first 3D printing job,” he says. “It was for a machine shop that was making some parts for Boeing and they wanted them 3D printed.”
Shuppert didn’t do the 3D printing himself. Rather, he converted the drawings the machine shop had into files that could be 3D printed and contracted out the actual printing. Doing that kind of work eventually led to a giant client: Amazon.
Amazon needed someone to create 3D-printable CAD files from countless drawings of industrial parts – screws, gears, pins, rivets, etc. – so that they could sell the files to designers who wanted to incorporate those parts into their designs. The files had to be amazingly precise, often with a tolerance of better than 5 thousandths. Shuppert’s team – he had 90 engineers on staff by then – created spreadsheets that permitted them to do parametric design, which allowed parts to be automatically scaled up or down in size.
“We did over a million CAD files for Amazon,” Shuppert says. “To this day we can still make the claim that that’s one of the biggest CAD design jobs in the U.S.”
The skill Shuppert’s team developed on that giant project led to other work, notably for the Department of Defense and its suppliers.
CAD/CAM Services is converting 30,000 hard copy drawings into 2D and 3D CAD for the Central Arizona Project.
“For example, we work for people who make aircraft carriers and other ships,” he says. “They’ll take a 300-foot ship, cut it in half, make it 50 feet longer and update it. But these ships are 30 years old, and they don’t have CAD files for them. So, we have to make the CAD files before they do anything.”
Today CAD/CAM Services employs 53 people, all but four of whom are engineers. The work is all done in the United States, since Defense Department contractors can’t risk having their designs handled overseas. The company has AS-9102 certification, which means big manufacturers know the part designs CAD/CAM delivers will be up to their standards.
Now to his idea for other APDSP members. He has a network of associates with 3D printing capability – including high-end steel parts – and has access to software that can automatically manage jobs on this network of 3D printers. He could create a widget that an APDSP member could put on their website using an iframe that would allow that member to offer extensive, sophisticated 3D printing services to their clients.
“The client would upload a 3D file, specify the number of pieces and the material, and it would give you a quote on the fly,” Shuppert says. “If the client OKs the project, the software would manage which printer or printers handle the job. The software knows which printers on the network are available the quickest. We have AWS process the payment and send x percent to the seller, another x percent to the software provider, and the bulk to the 3D printing folks, because they have the biggest cost in the puzzle. It would all be done automatically; nobody has to touch anything.”
If a client did not have a file that could be 3D printed, Shuppert could easily handle that part of the project, too.
“The big question is, is this something APDSP members want to get into?” Shuppert asks.
So that’s where this part of the story ends. If you’re interested in offering sophisticated 3D printing services without investing in the equipment and training, let Shuppert know by emailing him at scott@cadcam.org. He’ll give you more details.