Meso-scale thermal and solidification modelling for metallic additive manufacturing processes

Abstract

The emergence of additive manufacturing (AM) in recent decades signifies a paradigm shift in how we think about manufacturing. Throughout history, breakthroughs in manufacturing were focused on mass production, with a “one size fits all” mentality. Whilst for large batch size applications this has invariably decreased unit manufacturing costs, increased throughput and decreased prices for customers, it also imposes significant limitations for small batch production. Conventional manufacturing requires many highly specialised steps and equipment, requiring significant resources to establish and setting the barrier to entry unfeasibly high for fledgeling SMEs to enter the manufacturing space. Coupled with this, it inevitably forces manufacturers to be unresponsive to their customers’ needs, as changes to a product or manufacturing process are costly, and require significant machine downtime. Additive manufacturing on the other hand offers virtually limitless freedom to the manufacturer to make changes to a product, even for a one-off bespoke application, without significant machine downtime or costly modification to the manufacturing process. Perhaps even more importantly, since parts are generated additively many of the restrictions that traditional machining imposes on part design no longer apply, allowing for near-net- shape, highly optimised structures to be realised. However, these advantages do not come without a cost. Widespread adoption of AM is still hampered by less than ideal mechanical performance.