Compression molding tool production via additive manufactruring - Design and part optimization

Advanced Composites Manufacturing Innovation (IACMI), Oak Ridge National Lab Manufacturing Demonstration Facility (ORNL MDF), Century Tool, and Lyndoll Bassell have teamed together to focus on metal printing of tooling for compression molding composites. The goal of this technical collaboration was to evaluate the use of large-scale metal additive manufacturing (AM) to print metal molds for the mainstream (>100k units/year) production of large composite components by compression molding. Today, metal tools are typically made by subtractive machining of large blanks of forged tool steel, or sometimes by metal casting in conjunction with post-cast machining. Lead time for procuring a large forged blank is often many months. This drives program schedules and generates significant metal scrap. Metal AM has the potential to reduce lead time and waste, which would increase the viability of large-scale composites. Additionally, metal AM can provide unique advantages such as increasing geometric complexity and enabling design changes mid-program. For this project, baseline metrics for additively manufactured metal tooling were established, and small-scale metal tool was additively manufactured and evaluated. The results indicate that it is feasible to produce metal tooling for composites using metal AM.