Design and experimental validation of self-supporting topologies for additive manufacturing

ABSTRACT

Incorporating additive manufacturing (AM) constraints in topology optimisation can lead to performance optimality while ensuring manufacturability of designs. Numerical techniques have been previously proposed to obtain support-free designs in AM, however, few works have verified the manufacturability of their solutions. Physical verification of manufacturability becomes more critical recalling that the conventional density-based topology optimisation methods will inevitably require post-processing to smooth the boundaries before sending the results to a 3D printer. This paper presents the smooth design of self-supporting topologies using the combination of a new Solid Isotropic Microstructure with Penalisation method (SIMP) developed based on elemental volume fractions and an existing AM filter. Manufacturability of selected simulation results are verified with Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) technology. It is illustrated that the proposed method is able to generate convergent self-supporting topologies which are printable using FDM.

KEYWORDS:

• Topology optimisation
• elemental volume fractions
• level-set function
• smooth boundary representation
• additive manufacturing
• self-supporting design

Acknowledgments

The authors would like to thank Prof. Krister Svanberg for providing the MMA optimiser code. The topology optimisation group at Deakin University would like to thank technical coordinator Robynne Hall for her constructive suggestions about the implementation of the FDM technology. Mr Yun-Fei Fu appreciates Prof. Matthijs Langelaar providing the invaluable guidance about his AM filter.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes on contributors

Yun-Fei Fu is currently a Ph.D. student at Deakin University, Australia. His main area of research is topology optimisation for additive manufacturing.

Bernard Rolfe is currently the Director of the Deakin Digital Design and Engineering Centre (3DEC) and a Professor of Advanced Manufacturing at Deakin University, Australia. He obtained his B.Engineering(Hons) and B.Economics from the Australian National University (ANU). He spent several years as a business consultant before returning to complete a Ph.D. in Advanced Manufacturing from the ANU. He has held a continuing/tenured position at Deakin since 2005. His main research focus is the design and forming of lightweight structures.

Louis Chiu is a Research Fellow at the Monash Centre for Additive Manufacturing, Monash University, Australia. He completed his Ph.D. and graduated from the Aerospace Engineering/Science double degree with first class Honours at Monash University. He is currently working on the development of topology optimisation for application on additively manufactured components.

Yanan Wang is currently Senior Lecturer in Mechanical Engineering at School of Engineering, Deakin University, Geelong, Australia. He obtained his Ph.D. in Engineering from The Australian National University (ANU) in 2011. He has a strong background in Mechanical Engineering in general, as well as computational methods in engineering. His research interests include Thermal–Mechanical–Metallurgical Analysis of Hot Stamping of Advanced High Strength Steel Sheet Metal Forming with FEM Focus and Its Application in Automobile Industry, Topology Optimisation for Additive Manufacturing, Computational and Mathematical Modelling of Bone Remodelling under Mechanical and Electromagnetic Fields, Control Mechanism Analysis and Green Manufacturing etc.

Xiaodong Huang is currently a professor and ARC future fellow at Swinburne University of Technology, Australia. He obtained his M.Eng. in solid mechanics from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China and his Ph.D. in mechanical engineering from Swinburne University of Technology, Australia. His research was mainly focused on topology optimisation of structures and materials.

Kazem Ghabraie is currently the director of the civil engineering course and a senior lecturer at Deakin University, Australia. He obtained his B.S. and M.S. in civil engineering from University of Tehran, Iran and his Ph.D. in civil engineering from RMIT University, Australia. He is working on topology optimisation as his main area of research since 2004.

ORCID

Yun-Fei Fu http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0058-2349

Bernard Frank Rolfe http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8516-6170

Louis N. S. Chiu http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0361-0854

Yanan Wang http://orcid.org/0000-0003-0324-6519

Xiaodong Huang http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0176-2686

Kazem Ghabraie http://orcid.org/0000-0002-1043-3403