Home / Industrial Additive Manufacturing / Defense / Haddy 3D prints a drone boat for the U.S. military using robotic arms Defense Haddy 3D prints a drone boat for the U.S. military using robotic arms TF-179 vessel extends the Florida manufacturer's push into building maritime defense hardware layer by layer Joseph Caron-Dawe August 10, 2026 1 minute read Stay up to date with everything that is happening in the wonderful world of AM via our LinkedIn community. Haddy , a digital manufacturing company based in St. Petersburg, Florida, has produced a vessel called the TF-179 Drone Boat using large format robotic additive manufacturing. The company released photos of the finished vessel Saturday alongside a statement framing the project as part of a broader shift toward faster, more flexible methods of designing and building vessels, though it did not disclose which customer commissioned the TF-179 or what mission the boat is intended to perform. From furniture to defense hardware Haddy operates out of a roughly 30,000-square-foot (2,800-square-meter) facility in downtown St. Petersburg equipped with eight LFAM systems built by Dutch robotics firm CEAD, seven of which run on rails to extend their reach for larger parts. Jay Rogers, a former Marine who previously founded 3D printing venture Local Motors, started Haddy in 2022. The company opened what it describes as the world’s largest 3D printing facility, by total throughput and machine count, in April 2025. Haddy’s business began around printing furniture, architectural elements and molds before shifting increasingly toward defense work. A track record in maritime drones Haddy previously 3D printed the carbon fiber-reinforced hull of a low-profile unmanned surface vehicle for Rhode Island-based HavocAI, taking the vessel from design to sea trial in nine days. The company has also partnered with Blue Ops, the maritime drone division of Red Cat Holdings, to help double that unit’s production capacity for uncrewed surface vessels sold to U.S. and allied militaries. Tags future Joseph Caron-Dawe August 10, 2026 1 minute read