A multi-material part design framework in additive manufacturing

• Published in: International journal of advanced manufacturing technology Vol. 99; no. 9-12; pp. 2111 - 2119
• Main Authors: Yao, Xiling, Moon, Seung Ki, Bi, Guijun, Wei, Jun
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Springer London 01.12.2018; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Additive manufacturing; CAE) and Design; Computer-Aided Engineering (CAD; Decision making; Design for manufacturability; Engineering; Industrial and Production Engineering; Manufacturability; Materials selection; Mechanical Engineering; Media Management; Original Article; Process selection; Product design; Multi-materials; Design for AM; Design methods; Additive manufacturing
• ISSN: 0268-3768; 1433-3015
• DOI: 10.1007/s00170-018-2025-7

Additive manufacturing (AM) technologies provide more freedom to functional part design in various industries. One of the unique capabilities of AM is that multi-material parts can be produced with material compositional and geometric complexity. Multi-material parts have the advantage of achieving multiple performance requirements. In the research, we propose a framework for designing multi-material parts using AM processes. The proposed framework is composed of four interacting modules, including design requirement identification, primary material selection, AM process selection, material composition, and part geometry determination. Rules and guidelines for AM are integrated into the proposed framework with AM processes’ capabilities and constraints compiled in databases. We also introduce databases to assist in decision-making and ensure manufacturability of the designed multi-material part in various product design phases. The proposed framework is applied to a case study involving a conceptual design of a multi-material battery pack cooling plate.