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Completed TRL 5 (started at 4, targeting 5)
Project Objective
Tethon Corporation and the Marshall Space Flight Center’s Nonmetallic Materials and Space Environmental Effects Branch collaborated to present a transformative solution by developing ceramic additive manufacturing (AM) materials capable of producing parts with complex geometries that function in extreme environments.
Project Description
A UV-curable ceramic resin material capable of operating at temperatures of at least 2750°F was formulated that is suitable for 3D printing parts. The process will reduce part expense, allow for rapid design iteration, and reduce production lead time. Tethon’s Bison 1000 desktop Digital Light Processing 3D printer produced parts from various UV-curable resin formulations. These parts were tested to determine a preferred material and define the physical properties and performance.
Initial parts were 3D printed in a high purity alumina material. Test results with this material served as a baseline for continued material formulations with a target of thermal tolerance above 3182°F. Mechanical properties were be tested with a goal to achieve equivalency to current traditionally manufactured part
The work pursued by this project is essential to advance ceramic additive manufacturing from a TRL level 4 to a level 6 and accelerate the time to market for a uniquely valuable technical ceramic material. The knowledge gained will advance and expand the manufacturing capabilities of Marshall Space Flight Center and other government and commercial users.
Project Results and Conclusions
Tethon Corporation produced four types of samples for testing at Marshall Space Flight Center out of the baseline high purity alumina including tensile samples, density samples, compression samples, and thermal samples for plasma torch testing. Density samples have already been tested and show a lower density than expected which might reveal an issue in the sintering process. Tensile and compression samples are still in the process of being tested. Through the manufacturing of the thermal samples, the team learned a great bit about part design and how to optimize part infill in order to reduce cracking during the sintering process. The team is still working to produce a fully dense thermal test sample through optimization of part infill and layer thickness.
The objective of this project is to develop a UV-curable ceramic 3D material suitable for extreme environments that produces parts by a digital light processing (DLP) additive manufacturing platform.
This innovative approach is relevant and important to meeting MSFC and NASA’s need to develop resins for ultraviolet (UV) stereolithography (SLA) or digital light processing (DLP) additive manufacturing platforms. Solving current problems of traditional manufacturing methods with the adoption of ceramic additive manufacturing has genuine technical merit by expanding the number and variety of options for manufacturing practices. Additionally, ceramic additive manufacturing solves the identified problems of traditional ceramic manufacturing methods that are slow, expensive, and wasteful with considerable design limitations.
Benefits of ceramic 3D printing:
The primary goal of this project is to develop a UV-curable ceramic material suitable for fabricating end use parts that meets physical property goals, expense goal and production time goal. Accomplishing these goals will enable and improve future NASA space missions.
Physical properties of 3D-printed parts must meet or exceed the physical properties of parts fabricated by traditional methods for them to be considered for use. This project will assess the physical property of ceramic 3D-printed parts and compare them to traditionally manufactured ceramic and carbon cloth phenolic parts.
Production of most 3D-printed ceramic parts is less than 24 hours per part (sometimes <1 hour), with a 24-hour post-print sintering process, compared to months of fabrication with traditional injection molding or machining. A goal of reducing production times by 100% is targeted.
Cost reduction is achieved by utilizing low-cost raw materials, affordable hardware and short-term labor costs. Additionally, 3D-printed parts may out-perform current parts. By using AM ceramic components for current small motor test beds, parts that are currently single use can become reusable, significantly reducing the cost per motor. A cost of goods calculation will be provided for all parts produced as part of this project. This cost will be compared to that of traditionally manufactured ceramic parts.
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