Digitisation of metal AM for part microstructure and property control

Metal additive manufacturing, which uses a layer-by-layer approach to fabricate parts, has many potential advantages over conventional techniques, including the ability to produced complex geometries, fast new design part production, personalised production, have lower cost and produce less material waste. While these advantages make AM an attractive option for industry, determining process parameters which result in specific properties, such as the level of porosity and tensile strength, can be a long and costly endeavour. In this review, the state-of-the-art in the control of part properties in AM is examined, including the effect of microstructure on part properties. The simulation of microstructure formation via numerical simulation and machine learning is examined which can provide process quality control and has the potential to aid in rapid process optimisation via closed loop control. In-situ monitoring of the AM process, is also discussed as a route to enable first time right production in the AM process, along with the hybrid approach of AM fabrication with post-processing steps such as shock peening, heat treatment and rolling. At the end of the paper, an outlook is presented with a view towards potential avenues for further research required in the field of metal AM

Microstructural and texture evolution during thermo-hydrogen processing of Ti6Al4V alloys produced by electron beam melting

The present study was conducted to reveal the effects of building angles and post heat-treatments (2-step Thermo-Hydrogen Processing (THP) and conventional annealing treatment) on the density, microstructure and texture of Ti6Al4V alloy parts produced by Electron Beam Melting (EBM). The results showed that regardless of the building angle; the density, microstructure and crystallographic texture (defined with respect to building angle) of the as-produced samples were identical; having Widmanstatten a structure and columnar beta-grains which are parallel to building direction. The main texture component for the alpha phase was (10 (1) over bar0)//building direction, and for beta phase (001)//building or heat flow direction. The first step of THP, namely, the hydrogenation step, produced a needle-like microstructure and increased the local misorientations due to lattice distortion. On the other hand, after application of the second step of THP, dehydrogenation step, microstructure was refined, particularly alpha-grains that were larger than 10 mu m and located at grain boundaries. Moreover, THP randomized the crystallographic texture since it involves beta to alpha phase transformation, at which one beta-grain can produce 12 distinct alpha-variants. The grain boundary misorientation distributions also changed in accordance with the microstructural changes during the 2-step THP. On the other hand, annealing coarsened the grain boundary and Widmanstatten alpha phases; moreover, it changed the texture so that the basal planes (0001) rotated 30 degrees around the building direction