Effects of process parameters on the quality of PLA products fabricated by fused deposition modeling (FDM): surface roughness and tensile strength

Abstract

This study investigates the effects of process parameters on the quality of products fabricated by fused deposition modeling (FDM), such as surface roughness and tensile strength. Polylactic acid (PLA) samples were built on a FDM machine at various layer thicknesses, nozzle temperature and deposition head velocity. The effect of cooling the samples during the process was also considered. The experimental study was performed according to a mixed type Taguchi L16 orthogonal array. The effectiveness of each parameter was also discussed by an analysis of variance (ANOVA). The tensile strength results were compatible with the optical images of the fracture surfaces while the surface roughness results were compatible with the surface topography of the parts along the thickness. The two dominant quality characteristics were found to be layer thickness and deposition head velocity. Lower layer thickness values yielded higher tensile strength and lower surface roughness. Use of a cooling fan and nozzle temperature were found to be the least effective parameters. Finally, the results indicated that tensile strength and surface quality of the FDM samples improved about 25 %, and 12 %, respectively at optimal process conditions.

Surface Quality Enhancement of Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) Printed Samples Based on the Selection of Critical Printing Parameters

“…For instance, Altan et al [14] studied the effect of process parameters on surface roughness and the tensile strength on polylactic acid (PLA) samples. The samples were fabricated as per the ASTM standards and a Taguchi L16 experimental design, using three parameters: layer thickness, deposition head velocity, and nozzle temperature.…”

Analysis of the Accuracy and the Surface Roughness of FDM/FFF Technology and Optimisation of Process Parameters

“…They found that the surface roughness for PLA material ranged between 2.46 µm and 22.48 µm. In another research [13], there was used layer thickness between 0.1 mm and 0.4 mm to create PLA samples using a FDM process. The measured surface roughness fluctuated around 10 µm.…”

“…It is also evident from the searches that most of the authors are mostly focused on one-sided experiments. For example, the influence of process parameters on surface roughness [4,11,13], on dimensional or geometrical accuracy [14][15][16][17] is investigated, or mechanical properties and topography of printed samples are investigated [18][19][20][21].…”

Laser polished fused deposition poly-lactic acid objects for personalized orthopaedic application

“…Poor surface quality of the ME-made PLA parts that contains the deleterious staircase structure constrains their application as a final product for medical applications. Other than improving the surface quality by optimizing the processing parameters [23,24], post surface treatment reduces the deleterious staircase surface characteristics of ME products, which can be directly quantified by a reduction of surface roughness. Studies have investigated different post processing methods for improving surface quality of the ME products [25,26], such as barrel finishing, vapour smoothing and chemical etching techniques [27,28].…”