North Rhine-Westphalia, West Germany has recently launched the AddSteel project funded by NRW Leitmarkt to develop new functionally modified steel materials for additive manufacturing.
This three-year project, supported by global plant engineering company SMS Group GmbH and the Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology (ILT), will focus on certification of laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) development materials.
At present, the AddSteel project has successfully designed surface hardened and heat-treated steel powder. In addition, the SMS Group has built a factory that can produce suitable metal powders.
In the steel industry, steel materials that can meet the needs of complex lightweight components are scarce. Additive manufacturing technologies such as LPBF can produce lightweight and optimized metal 3D printed parts.
The Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology (ILT) has been exploring LPBF processes and materials for the aerospace, pharmaceutical, and automotive industries. Last year, the institute developed a new LPBF method that reduces residual stresses and deformations in components. The institute then tested 3D printed parts made of the superalloy Inconel 718, and the results showed "significant reduction in deformation".
Earlier, the Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology (ILT) and the Aachen University of Technology have won the EHLA Technology Development Award, a technology that blows powder directly into a laser beam and sends newly melted metal The process of deposition onto a prefabricated substrate.
Collaborators on the AddSteel project also found a lack of hardened and heat-treatable steel materials on the market. These materials can be used to 3D print crack-resistant components. The project partners chose to develop alloys during the iterative process, combined with system adjustments to the LPBF process and equipment. Demo samples of new components and spares will be used to test and verify performance and cost-effectiveness.