Additive Manufacturing

Materials and Manufacturing Additive Manufacturing

 

Rapid Qualification of Laser Powder-bed Fusion Additive Manufacturing (PB-FAM) Materials and Processes

To enable broader adoption of Metal-Based Additive Manufacturing (MBAM) technologies, the Materials and Manufacturing team is leveraging their vast industry experience qualifying laser direct energy deposition (DED) processes/components in the aviation and industrial gas turbine industries to develop a coupled experimental-analytical project aimed at developing a simplified qualification methodology for Inconel 718 that would provide companies lacking the computational and technical expertise necessary to performintegrated computational materials engineering (ICME) a pathway to qualify the products and processes they develop. 

View video of Additive Fusion Process

 

Sustainable Plastics and Composites

We have focused on understanding fundamentals of biomass structures and macromolecular functionalization to correlate thermoplastic compatibility with processibility in the melt, particularly for compression molding and additive manufacturing. Our studies aim to address global petroleum-based plastic challenges associated with manufacturing and sustainability. We utilize renewable materials combined with a wide range of flexible polymeric chains to produce materials with superior mechanical performance and excellent manufacturing characteristics. Our research also focuses on fundamental understandings of macromolecular behaviors during processing to enhance materials performance.

 

 

Development of Multifunctional Actuators

We have developed the materials, processes, software and analysis methods to create polymer multimaterials with predictable 3D deformation profiles towards the development of actuators. We have developed custom software to enable us to print multiple materials with differing moduli at specific angles and locations to control the 3D deformation profiles akin to the laminate theory developed for composites. We have used digital image correlation to correlate the local microstructure to the stress and strain of the materials and to characterize the 3D deformation profiles of the components.

 

Materials and Manufacturing Facilities