Influences of Material Selection, Infill Ratio, and Layer Height in the 3D Printing Cavity Process on the Surface Roughness of Printed Patterns and Casted Products in Investment Casting

Abstract

As 3D-printed (3DP) patterns are solid and durable, they can be used to create thin wall castings, which is complicated with wax patterns because of the wax’s fragility and high shrinkage ratio. According to this study’s experiment results, polylactic acid (PLA), polyvinyl butyral (PVB), and castable wax (CW) are suitable materials for preparing investment casting (IC) cavities. The results indicate that the casting product with the highest-quality surface is obtained using a cavity prepared using a CW-printed pattern. PLA- and PVB-printed patterns provide a good surface finish for casted products. In addition, the roughness of both the printed and casted surfaces increases as the printing layer height increases. The roughness of the casted surface varies from 2.25 μm to 29.17 μm. This investigation also considers the correlation between the infill ratio and mechanical properties of PLA-printed patterns. An increase in the infill ratios from 0% to 100% leads to a significant increase in the tensile properties of the PLA-printed pattern. The obtained results can be practically used.

Conformal Cooling Channel Design for Improving Temperature Distribution on the Cavity Surface in the Injection Molding Process

“…Instead of a complete factorial design, a fractional factorial design could be a compelling DOE for this study. There are two primary types of DOE for response surface designs: central composite design (CCD) and Box-Behnken design [48][49][50][51]. The Box-Behnken design has fewer experimental design points than the CCD design and only supports up to three levels of each variable.…”

Machine learning models to predict the relationship between printing parameters and tensile strength of 3D Poly (lactic acid) scaffolds for tissue engineering applications

“…Datasets of nozzle temperature, printing speed, layer height and tensile strength were obtained from four research papers [8][9][10][11]. Overall, this dataset covered 68 possible combinations of printing speed (40-80 mm s −1 ), nozzle temperature (205 °C-220 °C), layer height (0.15-0.8 mm), infill density (2%-100%) and tensile strength of PLLA.…”

Three-dimensional printed cellulose nanofibers/carbon nanotubes/silicone rubber flexible strain sensor for wearable body monitoring

“…Traditional fabrication methods of flexible tactile sensors, such as lithography, 19 screen printing, 20 and model casting, 21 have drawbacks including high cost, time-consuming processes, and challenges in preparing sensor microstructures. 22 In response, many researchers have turned to 3D printing technology to design micro and nano structures for flexible tactile sensors.…”