Additive manufacturing (AM) is a standardized term that includes a group of production processes of joining material successively, often layer upon layer. Since the market launch of the first AM machine in 1987, the field of AM has grown rapidly in both process variations and applications and has become a multi-billion-dollar industry. Many AM processes produce engineering materials that are being applied for critical parts in highly demanding user cases.
With AM came new ideas about functionally graded materials and building sensors directly integrated into parts.
Functionally graded materials with respect to material composition allow designs with a transition in physical properties through a component. This has been a topic of research for many years.
The primary objective of the project is to develop a process for the consolidation of multi-material powder layers with full three-dimensional freedom. Electrophotographic powder layer production is used together with laser consolidation to build an object layer by layer. The electrophotographic principle can transfer several materials simultaneously, thus producing an object with fully three-dimensional freedom in material and form. There are two main challenges:
1. Integration of the electrophotographic production and the laser fusing requires a laser transparent machine element that contains these attributes; dielectric layer, electrically conductive layer, and mechanically stable.
2. We aim to develop a mathematical model of laser light interaction with the powder layer and the machine element. Based on the modeling results, identify and decide on the required laser operation regime (cw, ns, fs), power, wavelengths, focus geometry, focus depth, and pulse repetition rate to achieve the desired fusion.
The project will apply special laser expertise and equipment that is connected to the research partners in the project.
Finally, we will demonstrate the principle through producing multi-material samples
