Co-axial wire feed electron beam additive manufacturing for aerospace applications

TWI is taking the lead in the Open Architecture Additive Manufacturing (OAAM) project to demonstrate the ability to manufacture large metallic components via Additive Manufacturing (AM) for the benefit of UK Aerospace.

The OAAM programme plans to develop direct energy deposition (DED) AM technologies that can be scaled up to accept multi-metre component sizes. TWI is working with project partners Airbus, Autodesk, Cranfield University, Glenalmond Group, University of Bath, University of Manchester and University of Strathclyde to create three DED AM process platforms. These new platforms will enable aerospace manufacturers and their supply chains to develop advanced AM manufacturing concepts in the following fields:

1. Arc-wire / Laser-wire AM @ Cranfield University.
2. Electron Beam wire AM @ TWI (Cambridge) – xBeam system manufactured by Chervona Hyvila.
3. Laser-powder / Laser-wire AM @ TWI (Yorkshire Technology Centre).

The project, which is supported by Innovate UK (ref: 113164), commenced on the 1 January 2018 and will run for three years.

Recent TWI Core Research Programme (CRP) work investigating material produced by the coaxially fed xBeam system has suggested beta grain refinement has occurred in this process. In-process videos appear to suggest a very controlled low heat input process where each layer sits directly on the previous layer without overflowing. This presentation will detail the work undertaken on the xBeam system and the metallurgical analysis completed on builds from the xBeam system from OAAM and CRP.