Companies today are designing products that are sophisticated, complex, and finely-tuned to operate in their working environments. With the use of CAE and FEA tools, designers are aggressively reducing their product’s time-to-market, cost, and material consumption. The Additive application harnesses the next level of design improvement by providing tools to simulate a part’s behavior during the manufacturing process for those using the latest techniques in additive manufacturing (3D printing). Already shown to be a revolutionary technology with immense advantages over traditional manufacturing methods, additive manufacturing brings unique challenges as well as opportunities for even more time and cost savings.
The Additive application simulates the layer-by-layer build process of metal parts undergoing Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF), a type of additive manufacturing that uses a laser to melt or fuse material powder together. As each layer is processed, the region under the laser experiences extremely intense, local heat that cools rapidly and results in thermal distortion. The simulation method uses a layer by layer accumulation of inherent strain to predict this distortion. As a user, you will gain critical insight into the complex physics-based phenomena associated with this layering process.
Simulating the build process may be performed at various points in the overall design/manufacturing process depending on your goals. Additive generates practical solutions to residual stress, distortion, and build failure, enabling you to:
Improve Product Design – In complicated, asymmetrical parts, shrinkage and distortion due to rapid heating and cooling during the 3D printing process may result in components outside of tolerances. Simulations of the build process show magnitudes and locations of part distortion. Designers can quickly make design changes to assure part conformance without iterations of trial and error builds.
Inform Build Preparation – Instead of building several part prototypes in different orientations on the build plate, simulations of these orientations reveal best orientation in a fraction of the time and expense.
Validate Build Preparation – Parts designed using powerful topology optimization tools result in complex and intricate shapes that present difficult challenges on where to place supports required for build. Simulations in Additive include the generation of optimized support structures using predicted residual stress accumulation as criteria for support placement and thickness. Engineers can use the optimized support information in their production builds to reduce build failures due to insufficient supports.
Simulations accurately predict part distortion during the build. Additive’s Distortion Compensation feature takes that information a step further and automatically creates a distortion compensated geometry, essentially reversing distortion effects. Engineers can use the compensated geometry file in their production builds and be assured of a final part that conforms to design intent.