NASA and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have published a strategy document proposing computer simulations as a tool to cut the time and cost of certifying metal 3D printed aviation components.
The 195-page report was developed over five years by a steering group known as CM4QC, comprising experts from Boeing, Lockheed Martin, GE Aerospace, Honeywell, RTX, Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), and several national laboratories. It sets out a detailed roadmap for weaving computational modeling into the qualification and certification process for metal 3D printed parts in commercial and defense aviation.
The push matters because, despite years of investment and genuine technical progress, metal AM has yet to make a significant dent in certified aviation hardware. The main obstacle is not the printing itself. It is what comes after.
Rethinking How Aviation Parts Get Certified
Under current rules, every new 3D printed metal part must be validated through exhaustive physical testing. Each change in alloy, printer model, or part geometry can trigger a fresh round of testing.
Certification in aviation was designed around conventional manufacturing, where materials behave predictably and uniformly. Metal 3D printing does not work that way. Because a laser melts and fuses thousands of layers of metal powder, the thermal history varies across the part, producing a microstructure that can differ from one location to the next.
Capturing and proving the safety of that variability through physical testing alone is slow, expensive, and does not scale well.
Thus, the report proposes using validated computer simulations to trace the physics from the laser beam all the way to the finished component’s mechanical performance, modeling how the microstructure forms, where internal stresses develop, and how the part is likely to behave under fatigue loading in service.
The concept is not entirely foreign to certification. Structural analysis software has been used in aircraft certification for decades. The goal here is to extend that same logic down to the materials level, where the complexity is considerably greater.
To make simulation results reliable enough for regulatory use, the report introduces a “Simulation Maturity Level” framework, a structured method for engineers and regulators to assess how much confidence to place in any given model, covering everything from code verification and experimental validation to uncertainty quantification.
Some simulation tools are already considered mature enough for industrial use, particularly those for predicting residual stress and thermodynamic behavior. CALPHAD, a computational method for modelling alloy chemistry, is one such example. Others, especially those predicting fatigue life from first principles, still need significant development.
If the roadmap is followed, the benefits extend well beyond additive manufacturing. The framework is designed to apply to any manufacturing process where the complexity of production makes traditional test-heavy certification impractical, including friction stir welding and powder metallurgy.
Flight certification by simulation alone is still some way off. But the industry now has a concrete, detailed plan for getting there.
Simulation Gains Ground in Metal AM
Generating the allowables data required to certify a single new material and process combination currently costs more than $1 million and takes upward of 18 months. That figure resets with each change in alloy, machine, or geometry. For a manufacturing method as variable and configurable as metal 3D printing, the math does not work.
That cost is driving a growing number of engineers and programmes toward simulation as a practical alternative.
At the 2025 AMUG Conference, Garrett Clyma, a computational fluid dynamics engineer at Flow Science, showed how melt pool simulation predicts defect formation in metal AM builds before printing begins. Using FLOW-3D AM, his team simulated a range of laser beam profiles applied to titanium alloy builds, with results matching physical experiments and in-situ X-ray data to within 10%.
The platform outputs temperature gradients, cooling rates, and melt pool velocity, the same variables that drive microstructure formation and, ultimately, mechanical performance. It is exactly the kind of validated process-level simulation the NASA/FAA roadmap identifies as a necessary foundation.
Elsewhere, Honeywell, a named contributor to the CM4QC steering group, is leading Project STRATA, a £14.1 million UK government-backed initiative that combines AI and physics-based simulation to develop and qualify 3D printed aerospace components.
The programme, which brings together simulation software developer BeyondMath, metal 3D printing specialist 3T Additive Manufacturing, and researchers at the Oxford Thermofluids Institute (OTI), is focused on accelerating design, reducing costs, and strengthening the UK’s AM supply chain.
The fact that a named contributor to the CM4QC steering group is running a live simulation-driven AM programme suggests the roadmap and industry investment are converging on the same outcome.
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Featured image shows the future state of product development with optimized CM + experimental approach. Image via NASA/FAA.
