Multiple material additive manufacturing – Part 1: a review

Abstract

Interest in multifunctional structures made automatically from multiple materials poses a challenge for today's additive manufacturing (AM) technologies; however the ability to process multiple materials is a fundamental advantage to some AM technologies. The capability to fabricate multiple material parts can improve AM technologies by either optimising the mechanical properties of the parts or providing additional functions to the final parts. The objective of this paper is to give an overview on the current state of the art of multiple material AM technologies and their practical applications. In this paper, multiple material AM processes have been classified and the principles of the key processes have been reviewed comprehensively. The advantages and disadvantages of each process, recent progress, challenging technological obstacles, the possible strategies to overcome these barriers, and future trends are also discussed.

Keywords:

• additive manufacturing
• multiple material objects
• multiple material additive manufacturing
• 3D printing
• rapid prototyping

Acknowledgments

The authors are grateful to Engineering Sciences, Faculty of Engineering and the Environment, University of Southampton, Invibio Ltd and The Royal Thai Government for supporting this work by providing research studentship to Mr. Mohammad Vaezi and Mr. Srisit Chianrabutra.