Abstracts Book - IMRC 2018

• SE2-O004
ANALYTICAL, COMPUTATIONAL AND EXPERIMENTAL STUDIES OF
THE MECHANICAL PROPERTIES OF ADDITIVELY MANUFACTURED
(FDM) LATTICE MATERIALS
Enrique Cuan Urquizo 1,2 , Atul Bhaskar 2
1 Tecnológico de Monterrey, Escuela de Ingeniería y Ciencias, Mexico. 2 University of
Southampton, Faculty of Engineering and the Environment, United Kingdom, Channel Islands
& Isle of Man.
Fused deposition modelling (FDM) is one of the most commonly used additive
manufacturing (AM) technologies. The process consists of extruded semimolten
filaments on a platform where, once the distance from the extruder to
the deposition is shifted, a subsequent layer of filaments can be deposited. The
stack of layer of extruded filaments forms the 3D object. This technology was
originally employed to build prototypes, however the current trend is to use it
to fabricate ready-to-use components. The nature of the process invariably
produces components with a degree of porosity that leads to anisotropy.
Therefore, it is fair to say that FDM-components are built of structured materials
also known as lattice materials. The relationship between the structure and the
property of lattice materials and structures fabricated using FDM process was
studied in this work analytically, computationally and experimentally. Lattices
with specified structural parameters were fabricated in a controlled manner
using customised trajectories of the extruder that generate the tool path as
desired.
Several steps were performed in order to have a thorough understanding of the
mechanical properties of the lattice formed. First, samples fabricated using FDM
were experimentally subjected to various loading scenarios: tension along the
filaments, 3-point bending, torsion and compression along the stacking
direction. The experimental data was then compared with finite element models
(FEM) of the lattice built and tested under the same loadings. While FEM is an
accurate tool for predicting structural behaviour, it could hide some of the
physics behind the micromechanics. To overcome this, the micromechanics of
the deformation mechanisms of the filaments under each of the loadings
mentioned were identified and employed to develop analytical models to
predict the macro or bulk properties. Analytical models allow, besides the
prediction of certain properties, the construction of a structure-property
relation upon utter understanding of the deformation mechanisms. Laboratory,