Watch the Energy Secretary Test Drive a 3-D-Printed Car
Energy Department
Ernest Moniz got behind the wheel of a 3-D printed Shelby Cobra.
3-D printing has gained traction in recent years, both in government and industry, and now the Energy Department has taken it to the next level.
The agency's Oak Ridge National Laboratory recently finished manufacturing a Shelby Cobra, and Secretary Ernest Moniz got to take the sports car out for a spin:
From concept to completion, the entire process took only six weeks. The lab team had to figure out how to find new ways to smoothly finish rough 3-D material and design an energy-absorbing structure, according to Lonnie Love of ORNL's Manufacturing Demonstration Facility.
"The reason I believe that DOE's Advanced Manufacturing Office got behind this was they saw that we didn't just want to repeat what had already been done -- we want to push the technology forward," Love said.
Watch the video below to see the team at Oak Ridge National Laboratory 3-D print a car: