3D Printing

3D print aluminum using Directed Energy Deposition

Optomec — a leading, privately-held global supplier of production-grade additive manufacturing (AM) equipment and software announced that its LENS Directed Energy Deposition (DED) systems can deposit any aluminum alloy, including those recently developed specifically for improved properties with AM processing.

LENS DED system printing aluminum powder onto an aluminum substrate.

This development opens the powder-based Optomec DED process to the transportation and aerospace industries to use AM to repair complex aluminum alloy parts using DED. The LENS simultaneous 5-axis system can handle aluminum alloy parts with complex geometries without the need for support structures. Deposition of aluminum alloys in a controlled atmosphere glove-box with low levels of oxygen and moisture ensures parts retain mechanical properties.

Aluminum alloy block deposited with LENS DED (left). Note the very smooth surface finish. Optical micrograph of polished and unetched sample from the same block (right). Note the low fraction of gas porosity (circles) measured at ~0.1% using image analysis with gray scale thresholding.

David Otazu, LENS Applications Engineer states “Our engineers have developed process parameters for aluminum alloys to provide an excellent surface finish, high deposition rates and a density of ~99.9%.” The Optomec LENS systems can successfully process all common materials used for AM including Steels, Titanium, Nickel, Copper, and now, Aluminum.

Optomec
optomec.com