Large Volume, Multi-material High Speed Sintering Machine

增材制造（又称工业3D打印）技术已被广泛认为对英国制造业的重塑、再支撑和可持续增长至关重要。缺乏工艺速度被认为是增材制造发展的最大阻碍，需要将速度提高4- 10倍于当今技术。高速烧结（http：//www.lboro.ac.uk/enterprise/hss/）是一种增材制造工艺，由EPSRC资助研究，在全球范围内获得专利授权。高速烧结（HSS）有可能成为世界上第一个增材制造工艺，能够以每个部件快于1秒的生产速度生产坚固的聚合物部件，并且成本与当今的大批量制造工艺（如注塑成型）相当。此外，HSS具有以可扩展的方式创建多材料部件的潜力。在这个项目中，我们计划创造世界上第一台能够实现高零件产量和多种材料的高速钢机床，从而为迄今为止不可能进行的具有国际意义的广泛研究提供可能性。高速钢的工作原理是首先将一个零件的3D计算机辅助设计模型制成薄片，然后将其切成薄层，每一层都由一个2D位图图像文件表示。将包含所有位图图像的计算机文件发送到HSS机床，这些位图图像构成待制造零件的每一层。该机器首先将一层薄薄的精细聚合物粉末沉积在一个平坦的平台上，然后使用一种专门用于吸收红外线能量的特殊墨水将待制造零件底层的位图图像打印到粉末上。接下来，灯在粉末/油墨的表面上发射红外能量，油墨吸收能量，变得足够热以熔化并将其正下方的聚合物粉末熔合在一起-未被打印的区域不足以熔化粉末。然后，机器在第一层上沉积另一层粉末，并打印下一层零件的2D形状，并再次在床表面上施加红外能量。这将第二层中油墨下的颗粒彼此熔化，但也将这些颗粒熔化到前一层中熔化的颗粒中，开始构建3D部件。该过程重复多次，以创建嵌入未熔化粉末的“蛋糕”中的部件。然后将未熔化的粉末去除，露出零件。高速钢已被证明可以使用单一材料进行小规模加工。该项目的目标是创建一个床面积为1米x 1米的大型机器，能够同时创建许多零件。我们的模型预测，1 m x 1 m x 1 m的床身将使每个零件的小部件生产速度<1秒，与当今同类最先进的机器相比，速度提高了10倍以上。我们将制造的机器还将使我们能够打印除吸收红外能量的墨水之外的其他材料-例如，我们将能够打印导电墨水，以便我们可以制造嵌入电子电路和电容器等设备的部件。制造机器将面临重大的技术挑战，特别是在粉末沉积和热控制方面;我们制造多材料部件的额外目标将在不同材料的喷墨打印和热控制方面提出实质性挑战。我们将通过首先进行一系列实验来应对这些挑战，例如粉末沉积方法和印刷不同油墨的方法，以告知我们的设计决策。我们将通过雇用一个工程师团队来创建机器，该团队在HSS工艺的主要发明者领导下，在生产制造研究设备方面具有良好的记录。

Additive Manufacturing (aka industrial 3D Printing) technologies have been widely recognised as extremely important for the reshaping, re-shoring and sustainable growth of UK manufacturing. The lack of process speed has been cited as the greatest inhibitor to growth of Additive Manufacturing, identifying a need for speed improvement by 4-10X over today's technologies.High Speed Sintering (http://www.lboro.ac.uk/enterprise/hss/) is an Additive Manufacturing process invented under EPSRC funded research with granted patents globally. High Speed Sintering (HSS) has the potential to be the world's first Additive Manufacturing process that is capable of producing robust polymer parts at a production rate quicker than 1 second per part and at a cost that is comparable with today's high volume manufacturing processes such as injection moulding. Additionally, HSS has the potential to create multi-material parts in a scalable manner. In this project we propose to create the world's first HSS machine capable of high part throughput and multi-materials and thus open up the possibility for a vast range of hitherto impossible research of international significance to be undertaken.HSS works by first taking a 3D computer aided design model of a part to be made and slicing this into thin layers, each layer being represented by a 2D bitmap image file. A computer file containing all the bitmap images that comprise each layer of the part to be made is sent to an HSS machine. The machine starts by depositing a thin layer of fine polymer powder onto a flat platform and then printing the bitmap image of the bottom layer of the part to be made onto the powder using a special ink designed to absorb infra-red energy. Next, a lamp emits infra-red energy across the surface of the powder/ink and the ink absorbs the energy becoming hot enough to melt and fuse together the polymer powder directly beneath it - areas that have not been printed do not heat enough to melt the powder. The machine then deposits a further layer of powder over the first layer and prints the 2D shape of the next layer of the part being made and again applies infra-red energy over the bed surface. This melts particles under the ink in the second layer to each other but also melts these particles to those that were melted in the previous layer, starting to build up a 3D part. The process is repeated many times to create a part that is embedded in a "cake" of un-melted powder. The un-melted powder is then removed to reveal the part.HSS has been proven to work on a small scale using single materials. The aim of this project is to create a large machine with a bed area of 1m x 1m that is capable of creating many parts simultaneously. Our models predict that a 1m x 1m x 1m bed will enable a production rate of small components <1 second per part, representing a speed improvement over 10X compared to today's comparable state of the art machines. The machine we will make will also allow us to print further materials additional to the ink that absorbs infra-red energy - for example we will be able to print conductive inks so that we can create parts with embedded electronic circuitry and devices such as capacitors.There will be significant technical challenges to create the machine especially in terms of powder deposition and thermal control; our additional ambition to create multi-material parts will present substantial challenges in terms of inkjet printing and thermal control of dissimilar materials. We will address these challenges by first conducting a range of experiments into aspects such as method of powder deposition and approaches to printing dissimilar inks to inform our design decisions. We will create the machine by employing a team of engineers with a strong track record for producing manufacturing research equipment led by the lead inventor of the HSS process.