Having served in the U.S. Marine Corps as an infantry company commander, John B. “Jay” Rogers Jr. has set his sights on building a game-changing international auto manufacturing operation.
It already has demonstration, sales and production facilities in Arizona, Nevada, Tennessee, Maryland, Berlin and Beijing.
As the CEO and co-founder of Local Motors, Rogers is exploring direct digital manufacturing (DDM), which utilizes 3D printing to create “open source” vehicles cooperatively designed by the company’s membership community of car enthusiasts and industry professionals.
The selection of vehicles on display at the company’s booth at the Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) Show included the DDM-produced LM3D Swim. Community member Kevin Lo provided the winning design as awarded by a panel of judges, including former Tonight Show host Jay Leno and SEMA Vice President of Vehicle Technology John Waraniak.
Rogers recently answered a series of questions posed by Aftermarket Business World:
Q: How would you characterize the reaction of this year’s SEMA attendees at your booth?
A: It was fantastic. We were busy the whole week, and the Swim was the main attraction. We printed the world’s first 3D-printed car, the Strati, at SEMA last year, and many of the attendees who visited our booth this year remembered that and were excited to see the latest version of the LM3D series. People asked a ton of questions about the car, and we’re excited to tell them our story.
Q: What is the status of the LM3D Swim? Is it roadworthy yet? Did you get any orders at SEMA?
A: We are not taking orders on the Swim yet. We expect to launch presales of the LM3D mid-next year (2016). We plan to start delivering early in 2017. The car is not yet fully crash-tested, but we expect it to be by the end of next year.
Q: How much of the vehicle is created via 3D printing? How are the designs and materials of the various components incorporated into this process?
A: By volume, about 80 percent of the car is 3D-printed. Primarily we print the 3D-printed car structure, which is the body and the chassis. We’re exploring printing options for every component of the car where the benefits of additive manufacturing can be applied. These benefits include low/no tooling cost, material usage efficiency, high-surface area parts and integrated mixed materials. For commonly available components – things like tires and batteries – sourcing the parts is the best option right now.
Q: Are you actively seeking components and/or designs from industry manufacturers?
A: Yes. Individuals and companies, including Tier 1, 2 and non-tier suppliers are all welcome in our solver community. We have had good early success bringing traditional suppliers into our process.
Q: Do you have marketing agreements in place with larger OEMs to further this technology?
A: No, but we have entertained many, and we are willing to partner with the right teams. Open, sharing, hypothesis-driven and technology-forward companies are our favorite partners.
Q: What has been the reaction in the communities to the microfactories that you are implementing?
A: When we started building microfactories our intent and our hope was that communities would embrace them with “local hero” status because of their size and the type of jobs, and the experience that they portend. We have thought about microfactories as the equivalent of a sports stadium and we have seen communities begin to embrace them in that way.
Q: Is your Knoxville, Tenn. plant currently under construction going to be a microfactory? Or will it be larger?
A: While it will be our largest facility, we will still refer to it as a microfactory, as the goal is to create local jobs and build cars on a local scale.
Q: Are the microfactories sourcing parts from local parts distributors?
A: Yes. As you engage in a local community in the production of real products with a full build of material, the natural inclination is to find local solutions to challenges that arise. From a theoretical perspective, those solutions could be found anywhere in the world and shipped, but from a practical perspective – especially in big hardware – local wins every time because iterations are more possible.
Q: Have the microfactories been sourcing car-building work from local repairers and installers? If so, are you seeking more vendors to become involved? What are the qualifications for a shop to be included?
A: At LM, we classify vehicle repair and development in both making and repairing. Though they both seem like similar activities, at their heart they do not share the same common root. In repair, the root of the work is about solving a puzzle. In making or assembly, the root of the work is about creating a system so that it won’t be a puzzle.
Given this distinction, we are looking for the makers in a community to help us create clean systems that are iteratively less and less of a puzzle. For the repairers in our ecosystem we are looking to expose the “puzzle” that we have created so that they can contribute their skills at problem solving in a distributed and immediate fashion. This joining of repair and making brings a new day of vehicle development, which is suited to STEM education and the real-time demands of our millennial community.
Q: You assisted in designing a high-tech pizza delivery vehicle for Domino’s. How did you become involved with this? Did this involvement lead to any technological advances that can be applied to other vehicles?
A: Four years ago I was keynoting in New York to the Brand 50, a top group of marketers in class-leading companies and nonprofits. It was the CEO of Foursquare and me that took the stage. Foursquare was talking about social currency for local events and I proposed small-scale vehicle development for communities and fleets.
Dominos’ CMO was one of the people in the audience. After the keynote, Domino’s approached Local Motors and asked if we’d be able to do a small-volume vehicle design for a fleet of pizza delivery vehicles which were more brand consistent and operationally efficient. So began the relationship to design the vehicle.
Retrofitting of the inside of a vehicle using large-scale additive is both a rapid way to prototype and then to go to production.
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