| Abstract Scope |
Laser powder bed fusion is the most widely adopted Additive Manufacturing technique for printing metals. However, due to stringent powder requirements regarding sphericity and flowability, metal powders are typically produced through gas-atomization, of which only a limited size fraction can be used. This makes LPBF more expensive and limits its material palette. Enabling the use of small, irregular powders through water-atomization, milling or waste streams would greatly reduce its cost and broaden its material palette.
In this work, a novel slurry-LPBF technique was developed in which powder particles are suspended within an aqueous solution. It is used to process WA 316L stainless steel powder with a diameter < 20 μm, which is irregularly shaped and too small for conventional dry-powder LBPF. Results show that a broad range of parameters result in near-full dense parts. The slurry cake shows a high packing density, which is promising for future research and applications. |