Joining technique for in-oven/autoclave molds manufactured by large scale polymer additive manufacturing

Ahmed Arabi Hassen, Emma Betters, Nikolaos Tsiamis, Justin West, Tyler Smith, Kazi Md Masum Billah, David Nuttall, Vipin Kumar, Scott Smith, Vlastimil Kunc

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Large scale additive manufacturing (AM) of fiber-reinforced polymer composites has gained traction in the mold and die community over the last decade, largely due to reduced material cost and lead time. However, limitations in mold size remain present due to printer volume constraints and costs associated with large format machines. This paper describes a method for producing additively manufactured polymer molds in segments with an O-ring joint design, which can be machined and subsequently assembled for autoclave applications. The developed joining mechanism allows for maintaining the vacuum integrity during the cure cycle while accounting for the anisotropic nature of the additively manufactured polymer molds. Over a range of tested temperatures, 20–200 °C, the multi-part mold joining design was able to achieve full vacuum of ∼73.7 cmHg (29 inchHg) and maintain a vacuum integrity with vacuum losses less than 1.5 cmHg/5min (0.6 inchHg).

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)77-82
Number of pages6
JournalManufacturing Letters
Volume32
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 2022

Funding

Research sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Advanced Manufacturing Office, under contract DE-AC05-00OR22725 with UT-Battelle, LLC. Part of this work was funded in part by the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), U.S. Department of Energy, under Award Number DE-EE0006926. Large-scale AM machine used in this research was sponsored by Cincinnati Inc., OH, USA. Feedstock materials used in this work were provided by Techmer PM., TN, USA.

Keywords

  • Joining
  • Large scale additive manufacturing
  • Molds
  • Vacuum integrity

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