Prioritization of process parameters for an efficient optimisation of additive manufacturing by means of a finite element method

At present, several tendencies like market globalisation induce an increasing usage of additive manufacturing technologies in different branches (e. g. mould and tool making, medical devices, aerospace and automotive industry). A resource efficient application of these processes requires a high process stability and reproducibility. Currently, these target figures are reached by numerous test rigs at the manufacturing system which cause high resource consumption and an uneconomic application of these processes. A virtual process design prior to the building phase is an opportunity to enhance the process efficiency of metal-based, additive processes. Previously developed technology specific simulation models enable users to examine and optimise different process parameter compositions. Though, whilst planning the design of experiments study for the simulation based optimisation, it should be considered, that with every single additional process parameter which is thereby taken into account the calculation time increases significantly. Regarding this fact, the presented research works in this publication are including procedure models for an efficient and target figure dependent analysis of a high amount of different process parameter constellations by means of the developed simulation models. Methods and procedures for the identification, categorisation and prioritisation of influencing parameters and their interdependencies amongst each other are shown for the target figure dimensional accuracy" and with utilising the alloy AlSil2. The results of these investigations are summarised in a process-specific prioritisation and correlation matrix.