Abstract
This article proposes a toward zero-support design method for irregular manifold manufacturing of composite materials based on layered adhesion equalization (LAE). Especially, external support in holes of irregular 3D manifold manufacturing by additive manufacturing (AM) is difficult to remove, which means toward zero-support design is indispensable to some complex curved surface components. AM largely depends on three main constraints, such as external support, layer thickness, and build time, which are mainly affected by building orientation and infill trajectory. Moreover, considering problems that variable layer thickness will bring material imbalance and residual stress heterogeneity, the layered orthogonal projection areas of the virtual printing prototype on the orthogonal planes, such as the positive plane and side plane in the 3D printing coordinate system, are introduced as LAE constraints to realize equilibrium reinforcement design (ERD) for both LAE and external support. Subsequently, using transient thermal structure coupling via finite element analysis, the transient thermal structure coupling analysis of fiber composite under multiple working conditions is further obtained. In particular, the influence mechanism of continuous fiber forming on the mechanical behavior of the topological configuration is revealed. Taking the irregular three-way manifold by concept design as an example, a specimen was fabricated using polylactic acid (PLA) with carbon fiber on the strength of fused deposition modeling. The infrared thermographs using thermal field measurement were carried out to obtain the temperature distribution during manufacture. The innovatively proposed LAE method is propitious to improve the additive manufacturability and adaptability of lightweight thin-wall structures, especially for fiber-reinforced composites. This is advantageous for utilisation in the domain of aerospace components.
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