Through-process modelling for optimized electron beam additive manufacturing

在过去的五年里，增材制造（AM）已经从一个利基学科发展成为通用电气（GE）、普惠（Pratt & Whitney）和劳斯莱斯（Rolls Royce）等跨国公司所采用的一个学科，用于制造关键结构部件，例如用于制造喷气发动机的部件。这些新的增材制造技术为制造商提供了缩短的开发时间、大规模定制和制造以前不可能的零件的能力。虽然新AM技术的发展加速，但关键问题继续限制其在制造业中的广泛采用，特别是对于必须达到苛刻性能要求的结构金属零件。AM面临的一个特殊挑战是过程控制。由于大量的过程变量提供给设计师/工程师，经验试错法工艺设计是危险的和不切实际的。为了确保在AM制造中可靠地满足形状和性能要求，必须在生产链中采用基于物理的预测模型。在这项提案中，我们的目标是通过开发一个经过验证的、完全耦合的贯穿过程模型，将机器控制与材料的微观结构和性能联系起来，来推进金属增材制造的最新技术。这项工作将与当地的加拿大公司PAVAC Industries Inc.合作进行，在电子束加工领域处于国际领先地位。这里提出的工作将支持AM制造的新的基本理解，以及基于PAVAC现有专业知识的新AM技术的开发。

Additive manufacturing (AM) has grown over the past five years from a niche discipline to one that is being embraced by multinational companies like GE, Pratt & Whitney and Rolls Royce for the manufacture of critical structural components such as those used in the manufacture of jet engines. These new AM technologies offer manufacturers reduced development times, mass customization and the ability to fabricate parts that were not previously possible. While development of new AM technologies accelerates, key issues continue to limit its wider adoption in the manufacturing community, particularly for structural metallic parts where demanding property requirements must be achieved. A particular challenge for AM is process control. Owing to the large number process variables available to the designer/engineer, empirical trial-and-error approaches to process design are risky and impractical. In order to ensure both shape and property requirements are reliably met in AM fabrication, physically based predictive models must be employed in the production chain. In this proposal we aim to advance the state-of-the-art for metallic AM production through the development of a validated, fully coupled through-process model that links machine control to material microstructure and properties. This work will be performed in collaboration with a local Canadian company, PAVAC Industries Inc., that is an international leader in electron beam processing. The work proposed here will both support new fundamental understanding of AM fabrication as well with the development of a new AM technology based on PAVAC's existing expertise.