Heat Treatment of Additively Manufactured Parts

As a novel manufacturing technology additive manufacturing has advantages such as energy saving, less material waste, faster design-to-build time, design optimization, reduction in manufacturing steps, and product customization [1] comparing to the conventional manufacturing. Heat treatment is widely used to improve the properties of conventional manufactured steel parts. The response of additively manufactured steel parts to heat treatment may be different from that of conventional manufactured steel parts. It is imperative to understand the heat treatment process of additively manufactured steel parts and determine the heat treatment process parameters. In the present work 20MnCr5 and AISI 8620 are selected to investigate the heat treatment effects on additively manufactured parts. The parts were fabricated by selective laser melting. 20MnCr5 and AISI 8620 parts are going to be carburized and compared the properties with the carburized wrought parts. The objective of present project is to determine the heat treatment process parameters for selected additively manufactured steel part to achieve properties which are comparable to corresponding conventional manufactured (wrought) steel part. 1. Jamshidinia, M., et al., Additive manufacturing of steel alloys using laser powder-bed fusion. Advanced Materials & Processes, 2015. 173(1): p. 20-24.