THE PROBLEM
America can design hardware in weeks. The metal takes months.
A shrinking supply base
The foundries, forges and tool shops that make big metal parts have been closing for decades, and the ones that remain have long backlogs.
Tooling before parts
Dies and molds take months to make and lock the design in place. Every design change means new tooling and another wait.
Hollow parts, made like solid blocks
Tanks, housings and casings are shells, but many are still cast or forged because that was the only practical way to make the shape.
OUR APPROACH
3D metal at the speed and cost of 2D.
With inflatable metal, we cut and weld sheet metal while it's flat, then inflate it into a rigid 3D structure. Because the hard work happens in 2D, we can make large 3D structures cheaper, faster and more efficiently than casting, forging or 3D fabrication.
Cheaper
Commodity sheet metal and simple 2D welds. No molds or dies to pay for.
Faster
No waiting on tooling or a foundry queue. A design change is a new cut file, not a new die.
More efficient
Material goes only where the structure needs it. Large parts can ship flat and take shape where they're used.
COMPANY
Make building big metal things in America fast again.
Astroform began at Northwestern University with an idea NASA engineers first called crazy: building metal structures by inflating them. That idea won NASA's Artemis Award. Now it's helping us reindustrialize America.
Artemis Award
CAREERS
Help rebuild how America makes metal.
We're growing our team of engineers and builders making real hardware for defense and space.
CONTACT
Want to work with us?
Tell us about a metal part that's slow, expensive or hard to source.