WORKSHOP THEORY AND PRACTICE-II

MODULE 4: ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING

Additive manufacturing, also known as 3D printing or rapid prototyping, is
‘the process of making objects from 3D model data, usually layer upon layer
by depositing material, as opposed to conventional subtractive
manufacturing methodologies such as machining. Every layer corresponds
to a section of 3D CAD model of the product. AM started with using plastic
materials because of ease of process ability and aim of making just visual
prototypes. The process has grown to include all types of materials.

The basic principle of this technology is that a model, initially generated

using a three dimensional Computer Aided Design (3D CAD) system, can
be fabricated directly without the need for process planning. Other
manufacturing processes require a careful and detailed analysis of the part
geometry to determine things like the order in which different features can
be fabricated, what tools and processes must be used, and what additional
fixtures may be required to complete the part. In contrast, AM needs only
some basic dimensional details and the materials that are to be used. This
technology was initially termed as Rapid Prototyping because the main
application was the manufacturing of prototypes, mock ups and sample parts.
However with development, not only prototypes but actual objects could be
manufactured by using this technology and hence the common terminology
today is Additive Manufacturing (AM) or 3D Printing.
All AM processes involve, to some degree at least, the following eight steps:
1. CAD
2. STL convert
3. File transfer to machine
4. Machine setup
5. Build
6. Remove
 7. Post-process
8. Application

1: CAD
All AM parts must start from a software model that fully describes the
external geometry. This can involve the use of almost any professional CAD
solid modelling software, but the output must be a 3D solid or surface
representation.

2: Conversion to STL
Nearly every AM machine accepts the STL file format, which has
become a de facto standard, and nearly every CAD system can output
such a file format. This file describes the external closed surfaces of
the original CAD model and forms the basis for calculation of the
slices.

3: Transfer to AM Machine
The STL file describing the part must be transferred to the AM
machine. Here, there may be some general manipulation of the file so
that it is the correct size, position and orientation for building.
4: Machine Setup
The AM machine must be properly set up prior to the build process.
Such settings would relate to the build parameters like the material
constraints, energy source, layer thickness, timings, etc.
5: Build
Building the part is mainly an automated process and the machine can
largely carry on without supervision. Only superficial monitoring of
the machine needs to take place at this time to ensure no errors have
 taken place like running out of material, power or software glitches,
etc.
6: Removal
Once the AM machine has completed the build, the parts must be
removed. This may require interaction with the machine.
7: Post-processing
Once removed from the machine, parts may require an amount of
additional cleaning up before they are ready for use. Parts may be weak
at this stage or they may have supporting features that must be
removed. This therefore often requires time and careful, experienced
manual manipulation.
8: Application
Parts may now be ready to be used. However, they may also require
additional treatment before they are acceptable for use. For example, they
may require priming and painting to give an acceptable surface texture and
finish.

Advantages:

1. Design complexity and freedom: AM allows for design with such

complexity which was simply impossible for conventional subtractive
manufacturing.
2. Speed and less man power requirement: AM can produce products at
very high speed and also does not require any man power during the
manufacturing process.
3. Customization: AM allows mass customization, products can be
manufactured as per individual need and requirement with ease
without any extra production cost.
4. Tool less manufacturing: In conventional manufacturing, tool making
is one of the most time consuming and labour intensive aspect. AM
eliminates need for tools and this is turn leads to decrease in cost, time
and labour.
5. Extreme lightweight design: AM enables lightweight designs suitable
for various applications.
6. Sustainable and environment friendly: In AM, there is significant drop
in loss of material and utilization of almost 90% of initial material
takes place which is more than twice compared to conventional
 machining. This reduces waste. As whole the AM process imposes a
reduced carbon footprint compared to conventional machining.
7. No storage cost: AM allows printing of objects as and when required
and as such the need for storage reduces.
8. Removal of constraints like distance: AM reduces the distance
constraint is manufacturing, NASA is trying to manufacture in space
while controlling from Earth.
Disadvantages:
1. Limitation of raw materials- those available may be costly.
2. Limitation of size.
3. Complexity in initial CAD designing- experts are required.
4. Cost of printers.
5. Removal of support structures
6. Chance for unethical use to produce dangerous objects.

CLASSIFICATION OF AM PROCESSES
Nylon, or Polyamide, is commonly used in powder form with the sintering
process or in filament form with the Fused Deposition Modelling process. It
is a strong, flexible and durable plastic material that has proved reliable for
3D printing. It is naturally white in colour but it can be coloured — pre- or
post-printing. This material can also be combined (in powder format) with
powdered aluminium to produce another common 3D printing material for
sintering Alumide.
ABS Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene is another common plastic used for 3D
printing, and is widely used on the entry-level FDM 3D printers in filament
form. It is a particularly strong plastic and comes in a wide range of colours.
PLA Polylactic Acid is a bio-degradable plastic material that has gained
traction with 3D printing for this very reason. It can be utilized in resin
format for DLP/SL processes as well as in filament form for the FDM
process. It is offered in a variety of colours, including transparent, which has
proven to be a useful option for some applications of 3D printing. However
it is not as durable or as flexible as ABS.
METAL
A growing number of metals and metal composites are used for industrial
grade 3D printing.
Two of the most common are aluminium and cobalt alloys.
One of the strongest and therefore most commonly used metals for 3D
printing is Stainless Steel in powder form for the sintering/ melting/EBM
processes. In the last couple of years Gold and Silver have been added to the
range of metal materials that can be 3D printed directly, with obvious
applications across the jewellery sector. These are both very strong materials
and are processed in powder form.
Titanium is one of the strongest possible metal materials and has been used
for 3D printing industrial applications for some time. Supplied in powder
form, it can be used for the sintering/melting/ EBM processes.
Composites
_ Composites are engineered or naturally occurring materials made from two
or more constituent materials undergoing chemical reaction with
significantly different physical or chemical properties that remain separate
and distinct at the macroscopic or microscopic scale within the finished
structure but exhibit properties that cannot be achieved by any of the
materials acting alone.
_ Composite materials have been used for lightweight components in many
industries such as: aerospace, automotive, nuclear, marine, and biomedical
industries. They offer high mechanical strength and high performance for
specific applications. Lightweight composites include Polymer Matrix
Composites PMC (i.e. fiber-reinforced polymers) and Metal Matrix
Composites MMC (i.e. aluminium matrix composites and TiAl-based
composites).

SOME COMMON ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING PROCESSES:

STEREOLITHOGRAPHY (SLA)
• One of the most important additive manufacturing technologies
currently available.
• The first ever commercial Rapid Prototyping systems were resin-based
systems commonly called stereolithography or SLA.
• The resin is a liquid photosensitive polymer, generally epoxy and
acrylic resin that cures or hardens when exposed to ultraviolet
radiation.
• This technique involves the curing or solidification of a liquid
photosensitive polymer through the use of the irradiation light source.
• The source supplies the energy that is needed to induce a chemical
reaction (curing reaction), bonding large number of small molecules
and forming a highly cross-linked polymer.
SLA creates solid parts by selectively solidifying a liquid photopolymer resin
using an UV laser. As with many other AM processes, the physical parts are
manufactured by fabricating cross-sectional slices, one on top of another.
These slices are created by tracing the CAD model in a pool of photopolymer
resin with a laser. The part being built rests on a platform that is dipped into
the pool of resin. After each slice is created, the platform is lowered, the
surface is recoated, and then the laser starts to trace the next slice of the CAD
model, building the prototype from the bottom up. The creation of the part
requires a number of key steps: input data, part preparation, layer
preparation, and finally laser scanning of the two dimensional cross-sectional
slices. The input data consists of a STL created from a CAD file, part
preparation is the phase at which the operator specifies support structures, to
hold each cross section in place while the part builds, and provides values
for machine parameters. These parameters control how the prototype is
fabricated in the SLA machine. Layer preparation is the phase in which the
STL model is divided into a series of slices, as defined by the part preparation
phase, and translated by software algorithms into a machine language. This
information is then used to drive the SL machine and fabricate the prototype.
The laser scanning of the part is the phase that actually solidifies each slice
in the SL machine.
After building the part, the part must be cleaned, post-cured, and finished.
During either the cleaning or finishing phase, the SLA machine operator may
remove support structures. During finishing, the operator may spend
considerable time sanding and filing the part to provide the desired surface
finishes.

Fused deposition modelling (FDM)

It is an additive manufacturing technology commonly used for modelling,
prototyping, and production applications.
The Technology:
The Fused Deposition Modelling (FDM) process constructs three-
dimensional objects directly from 3D CAD data. A temperature-controlled
head extrudes thermoplastic material layer by layer.
The FDM process starts with importing an STL file of a model into a pre-
processing software. The system operates in X, Y and Z axes, drawing the
model one layer at a time. This process is similar to how a hot glue gun
extrudes melted beads of glue. The temperature-controlled extrusion head is
fed with thermoplastic modelling material that is heated to a semi-liquid
state. The thermoplastics are liquefied and deposited by an extrusion head,
which follows a tool-path defined by the CAD file. The materials are
deposited in layers as fine as 0.04 mm (0.0016") thick, and the part is built
from the bottom up – one layer at a time. FDM works on an "additive"
principle by laying down material in layers. A plastic filament or metal wire
is unwound from a coil and supplies material to an extrusion nozzle which
can turn the flow on and off. The nozzle is heated to melt the material and
can be moved in both horizontal and vertical directions by a numerically
controlled mechanism, directly controlled by a computer aided
manufacturing (CAM) software package. The model or part is produced by
extruding small beads of thermoplastic material to form layers as the material
hardens immediately after extrusion from the nozzle. The head extrudes and
directs the material with precision in ultrathin layers onto a fixtureless base.
Once the part is completed the support columns are removed and the surface
is finished.

Process:
Several materials are available with different trade-offs between strength and
temperature properties such as acrylonitrile butadiene styrene (ABS)
polymer, polycarbonates, polycaprolactone, polyphenyl sulfones and waxes.
FDM machines made by Stratasys are very successful and meet the demands
of many industrial users. This is partly because of the material properties and
partly because of the low cost of the entry-level machines. There are,
however, disadvantages when using this technology, mainly in terms of build
speed, accuracy, and material density. As mentioned earlier, they have a
layer thickness option of 0.078 mm, but this is only available with the
highest-cost machine and use of this level of precision will lead to longer
build times. Note also that all nozzles are circular and therefore it is
impossible to draw sharp external corners; there will be a radius equivalent
to that of the nozzle at any corner or edge. Internal corners and edges will
also exhibit rounding. The actual shape produced is dependent on the nozzle,
acceleration and deceleration characteristics, and the viscoelastic behaviour
of the material as it solidifies
Laminated Object Manufacturing:
A manufacturing process that uses a carbon-dioxide laser to create
successive cross sections of a three-dimensional object from layers of paper
with a polyethylene coating on the backside. The working principle of the
Laminated Object Manufacturing (LOM) process consists of stacking thin
sheets of material which are cut according to a layer raster pattern. These
layers are assembled and bonded to form a three dimensional component.
In this process layers of adhesive-coated paper, plastic, or metal laminates
are successively glued together and cut to shape with a knife or laser cutter.
Objects printed with this technique may be additionally modified by
machining or drilling after printing.
•A sheet of paper is fed through with the aid of small rollers. As the paper is
fed through, a heated roller is used to melt the coating on the paper so that
each new layer will adhere to the previous layer. Laser cross hatches non-
part area to facilitate waste removal
•Platform with completed layer moves down out of the way
•Fresh sheet of material is rolled into position
•Platform moves up into position to receive next layer
Any material in sheet form can be used in this process if accompanied by a
suitable binding method. Bond-then-form sheet lamination principles have
also been successfully applied to fabrication of parts from metal, ceramic,
and composite materials.

Specific advantages of LOM

: (a) Little shrinkage, residual stresses, and distortion problems within the
process; (b) when using paper feedstock, the end material is similar to
plywood, a typical pattern making material amenable to common finishing
operations; (c)large parts can be fabricated rapidly; (d) a variety of build
materials can be used.
LOM has several limitations, including: (a) most paper-based parts require
coating to prevent moisture absorption and excessive wear; (b) the control of
the parts accuracy in the Z dimension is difficult (due to swelling or
inconsistent sheet material thickness); (c) mechanical and thermal properties
of the parts are inhomogeneous due to the glue used in the laminated
structure; and (d) small part feature detail is difficult to maintain due to the
manual decubing process.
Selective Deposition Lamination (SLD)
The ASTM defines SDL as sheet lamination additive manufacturing process
on which sheets of material are bonded to form an object. This is a 3D
printing process which uses paper as raw material. It is very similar to
laminated object manufacturing process. The process is consisting of
adhesive coated papers which are glued successively together with heated
roller and cut the shape with cutter layer by layer. From one side roller feeds
the paper after completion of each layer to form second one. Material used
having very low cost as we can shelf copy papers from any office or store.
End product of SDL has wood like appearance thus they can further process
using some wood finishing techniques. It differs from LOM in couple
regards, mostly in gluing technique. SDL applies glue to part that will form
final object, whereas LOM glues entire sheet uniformly. Some of new
printers in SDL can produce full colour objects by colouring outer edge of
the cross section. In the initial stage of process a paper sheet is placed on the
platform. In the next step glue is selectively applied to paper, much higher
glue for working area & much lower for support area to ensure easy support
removal. In the next step new sheet is placed over the previously glued sheet
through paper feeding mechanism. Now the built plate is moved up near to
heat plate & pressure is applied to have uniform bonding. The build plate
then comes to build height, where sharp edge tool cuts one sheet of paper
according to design data and forms edge of part. After completion of one
sheet, next sheet is deposits until the part is completed.

Selective Laser Sintering:

Sintering is a heat treatment process in which a large quantity of loose
aggregate material is subjected to a sufficiently high temperature and
pressure to cause the loose material to become a compact solid piece. The
amount of heat and pressure administered during the sintering process is
slightly less than the material's melting point.
Laser sintering and laser melting (SL, SLM) are interchangeable terms that
refer to a laser based 3D Printing process that works with powdered
materials.
The laser is traced across a powder bed of tightly compacted powdered
material, according to the 3D data fed to the machine, in the X-Y axes. As
the laser interacts with the surface of the powdered material it sinters, or
fuses, the particles to each other forming a solid. As each layer is
completed, the powder bed drops incrementally and a roller smoothens the
powder over the surface of the bed prior to the next pass of the laser for the
subsequent layer to be formed and fused with the previous layer.

The build chamber is completely sealed as it is necessary to maintain a

precise temperature during the process specific to the melting point of the
powdered material of choice. Once finished, the entire powder bed is
removed from the machine and the excess powder can be removed to leave
the ‘printed’ parts. One of the key advantages of this process is that the
powder bed serves as an in-process support structure for overhangs and
undercuts, and therefore complex shapes that could not be manufactured in
any other way are possible with this process.
However, on the downside, because of the high temperatures required for
laser sintering, cooling times can be considerable. Furthermore, porosity has
been an historical issue with this process, and while there have been
significant improvements towards fully dense parts, some applications still
necessitate infiltration with another material to improve mechanical
characteristics.
Laser sintering can process plastic and metal materials, although metal
sintering does require a much higher powered laser and higher in-process
temperatures. Parts produced with this process are much stronger than with
SL or DLP, although generally the surface finish and accuracy is not as good.
Ultrasonic AM or Ultrasonic consolidation:
UAM is ultrasonic welding on a semi-continuous basis where solid metal
objects are built up to a net three-dimensional shape through a succession of
welded metal tapes. Through periodic machining operations, detailed
features are milled into the object until a final geometry is created by
removing excess material. The figure at right shows a rolling ultrasonic
welding system, consisting of two 20,000 hertz ultrasonic transducers and
the welding sonotrode. High frequency ultrasonic vibrations are locally
applied to metal foils, held together under pressure, to create a weld. The
vibrations of the transducer are transmitted to the disk-shaped welding
sonotrode, which in turn creates an ultrasonic solid-state weld between the
thin metal tape and the substrate. The continuous rolling of the sonotrode
over the plate welds the entire tape to the plate. Successive layers are welded
together to build up height. This process is then repeated until a solid
component has been created.
The important controllable process parameters of UC are: (a) oscillation
amplitude, (b) normal force, (c) travel speed, and (d) temperature.
This process can provide a variety of products. The UAM printing process
allows for the creation of electronics embedded within closed objects. It also
works for products with complex internal geometries, fiber embedded
material, and internal cavities.
UAM 3d printing is also suitable for various rapid prototyping applications.
UAM prototyping services can create objects with deep voids and slots as
well as objects with latticed or honeycombed structures. UAM prototyping
supports typical metals such as aluminium, copper, stainless steel, and
titanium.
 Ultrasonic AM set up

Laser Engineered Net Shaping (LENS)

Laser engineered net shaping (LENS) uses computer-controlled lasers that,

in hours, weld air blown streams of metallic powders into custom parts and
manufacturing moulds. The technique produces shapes close enough to the
final product to eliminate the need for rough machining. One of the purposes
of LENS is to make small lots of high-density parts or moulds. Nozzles each
direct a stream of metal powder at a central point beneath them.
Simultaneously, that point is heated by a high-powered laser beam. The laser
and jets remain stationary while the model and its substrate are moved to
provide new targets on which to deposit metal continually, as shown in
Figure. First, this is done on a substrate, and then on the built up layers, until
the desired cross-sectional geometry is completed with production of a 3D
metal product. This is a complicated operation because high temperatures
make it difficult to form accurate, smooth objects from molten metals. The
technology can be used with a wide variety of metals including titanium,
steels, copper, and aluminium.

Electron Beam Melting

Similar to SLM; in the EBM process, a focused electron beam scans across
a thin layer of pre laid powder, causing localized melting and re-
solidification as per the slice cross-section. Electron beams are inherently
different from laser beams, as electron beams are made up of a stream of
electrons moving near the speed of light, whereas, laser beams are made up
of photons moving at the speed of light.
As a high energy beam, EB is often compared to laser. The EB process has
a number of advantages over high power lasers (in this paper, high power
lasers are defined as CO2 laser having a minimum output power of 10 kW).
Advantage of electron beam:
1. The EB output power can be controlled in a very wide range whereas CO2
laser have a minimum output power of 10 kW. This allows fine detail (0.030”
wall thickness) to be deposited using power output as low as several hundred
Watts, while high deposition rates (greater than 40 lbs. per hour) can be
achieved with the same system at higher power levels.
2. The EB process is inherently power efficient, on the order of magnitude
of 90% or better. The power efficiency of CO2 laser process is about 10%.
3. Electrons have a negative charge and are focused and deflected
magnetically, whereas photons are optically focused and deflected using
mirrors attached to motors. As a result, since magnetic coils have an almost
instantaneous response to changing input conditions, an electron beam can
be scanned slowly or very rapidly. In essence an electron beam can be moved
instantaneously from one location to another without needing to traverse the
area in between. In contrast, galvanometers are mirrors attached to motors.
For a laser beam focal spot to move from point A to point B, the
galvanometer motors have to move the mirrors accordingly. Thus, virtually
instantaneous motion is not possible.
4. Another key advantage over laser beam processing is the coupling
efficiency of the EB with the deposited material. For optical energy such as
a laser beam, the reflectance for metals at room temperature can range from
40% to over 95%. Thus, a portion of the incidence energy is reflected out of
the melt pool and lost to the atmosphere. This prohibits some materials such
as aluminium from being effectively deposited with a laser. The coupling
efficiency of an EB is very high and allows highly reflective materials to be
deposited efficiently.
5. Also, because the EB process is typically operated within a high vacuum
environment, this provides for an oxygen-free atmosphere. Therefore,
secondary inert gases are not required to insure the chemical integrity of the
material.
DISADVANTAGES
Laser beams heat the powder when photons are absorbed by powder
particles. Electron beams, however, heat powder by transfer of kinetic
energy from incoming electrons into powder particles. As powder particles
absorb electrons they gain an increasingly negative charge. This has two
potentially detrimental effects:
(1) If the repulsive force of neighbouring negatively charged particles
overcomes the gravitational and frictional forces holding them in place, there
will be a rapid expulsion of powder particles from the powder bed, creating
a powder cloud
(2) Increasing negative charges in the powder particles will tend to repel
the incoming negatively charged electrons. As a result, the effective melt
pool size increases, creating a larger heat-affected zone. The conductivity of
the powder bed in EBM must be high enough that powder particles do not
become highly negatively charged.

Electron Beam Free Form Fabrication (EBFFF)

EBFFF makes use of commercially available “welding wire” ((GMAW) wire
(FCAW) wire) as its feedstock material. The welding wire is deposited on a
substrate plate of like material. With the EBFFF fabrication method, metallic
preforms can be manufactured from computer generated 3D drawings or
models. In this operation, the deposition path and process parameters are
generated from post-processing the virtual 3D model and executed by a real
time computer control. The deposition takes place in a vacuum environment,
typically in the range of 1x10-4 to 1x10-5 Torr. The wire is directed toward
the molten pool and melted by a focused EB. Part are built up layer by layer
by moving the EB and wire source across the surface of the underlying
material that is commonly referred to as the substrate, as shown in Figure 1.
The substrate material can become an integral part of the finished product.
In this manner, freestanding shapes, or preforms, are generated without
moulds or dies. Conventional techniques are then used to machine the
preform to the final part geometry.
WIRE ARC ADDICTIVE MANUFACTURING
Uses electric arc welding techniques like plasma arc, MIG, TIG etc. to make
3d object.