Simulation of the temperature distribution in the selective beam melting process for polymer material

Abstract

In the present contribution the temperature distribution in the selective beam melting process for polymer materials is simulated to better understand the influence of process parameters on the properties of the produced part. The basis for the developed simulation tool is the nonlinear heat equation including temperature dependent functions for the heat capacity and the heat conduction which were obtained by experimental measurements. The effect of latent heat occurring in the process is also taken into account. The heat equation is discretized in time and space where a Runge-Kutta method of Radau IIA type is used for time integration. An adaptive finite element method is applied for the discretization in space and the model is implemented into the finite element library deal.II. The heat and cooling rate as important process parameters are simulated for different beam velocities. The ability for computing these process parameters makes the simulation tool suited for optimizing the process management of selective beam melting plants.

Thermomechanical simulation of the selective laser melting process for PA12 including volumetric shrinkage

“…The present contribution extends the heat transfer model from [8] to a thermomechanical one to simulate not only the temperature, but also the warpage of the material occurring in the selective laser melting process. Furthermore the shrinkage of the powder when becoming melt is included, which has a great effect on the dimensional accuracy of the produced part and the deposition of the next powder layer.…”

“…In [7], not only the influence of the laser parameters on the temperature was investigated, but also the resulting melting pool dimensions for PA12 powder. A nonlinear heat transfer model was used in [8] to compute the temperature distribution to analyze the heat and cooling rates of PA12 for various laser parameters.…”