Marines 3D-Print a 7-Meter Raiding Craft in Okinawa

Marines in Okinawa can now manufacture a working raiding craft in theater instead of waiting for one to ship across the Pacific.

That capability moved from concept to the water on June 29 when Intermediate Repair Company, 3rd Maintenance Battalion, 3rd Marine Logistics Group put a 7-meter foam hull into the water at White Beach Naval Facility and ran both manned and unmanned operations.

Building the Hull Where It Is Needed

The craft was the most visible result of Resilient Advanced Manufacturing For Contested Environments, or RAMFORCE. Under the Manufacturing Attritable Systems at Scale effort, Marines worked with engineers from Naval Surface Warfare Center Carderock to build the modular foam hull. They used only three primary pieces of equipment: a computer numerical control router, a large-format polymer 3D printer, and a spray foam and coating system.

Materials were selected for worldwide availability so units could source them locally if needed. A previous 5-meter prototype took roughly 16 working hours and about $11,000 in materials. Once scaled with a 12-person team, the group believes a 5-meter platform could be produced every four hours and a 7-meter platform every six hours.

Print on the Move

The White Beach demonstration also capped another RAMFORCE experiment called Print on the Move. Marines tested whether commercially available polymer 3D printers could keep producing parts while being transported on tactical vehicles and watercraft.

One printer continued fabricating a component during the move to White Beach and even while aboard the foam raiding craft as it operated on the water. The tests assessed which combinations of printers, materials, and software could handle the vibration and environmental conditions of expeditionary operations.

Beyond the Boat

RAMFORCE went well beyond the boat. Marines trained on nScrypt's nRugged system, a ruggedized platform that diagnoses faults on circuit cards, restores damaged electrical pathways, and replaces components in austere environments instead of swapping entire expensive assemblies.

Another team practiced cold spray repair, accelerating powdered aluminum and nickel at subsonic speeds onto worn metal surfaces without melting the base material. The new layer is then machined back to specification, extending the service life of parts already in theater.

Oak Ridge National Laboratory's Manufacturing Demonstration Facility showed hybrid manufacturing that digitally scans a damaged part, recreates it with wire-fed additive manufacturing, then finishes it with subtractive machining in a single machine.

What It Means for the Force

For Marines operating across the vast distances of the Pacific, the difference between mission success and failure can come down to whether a broken part or missing platform can be fixed or built before the traditional supply chain delivers it.

The equipment and partnerships from RAMFORCE remained with Intermediate Repair Company after the exercise so the unit can continue refining the capabilities. Senior leaders from III Marine Expeditionary Force and 3rd Marine Logistics Group observed the White Beach demonstration.