Journal of Materials Processing Technology 113 (2001) 269272

Direct metal laser sintering for rapid tooling: processing and characterisation of EOS parts
M.W. Khainga, J.Y.H. Fuhb,*, L. Lub
b a TEC Electronics Singapore Pte. Ltd., Singapore 569138, Singapore Department of Mechanical Engineering, National University of Singapore, 10 Kent Ridge Crescent, Singapore 119260, Singapore

Abstract Direct metal laser sintering (DMLS) fabricates metal prototypes and tools directly from computer aided design (CAD) data. The process is popular in rapid tooling (RT) ,since a suitable metal powder can be used to produce the metal parts and tools. The powder system may be pre-alloyed powder or multi-phase powder. The properties of the RT parts, however, depend on its composition and solidication conditions. Accuracy, wear resistance and mechanical properties are critical on choosing the rapid tooling mould as the production-grade tooling. This study includes the design of metal prototypes which are then fabricated by EOS's DMLS. The EOS material system is a mixture of nickel, bronze and copper-phosphide material. The dimensional accuracy, surface roughness, impact toughness, hardness, and strength of EOS parts are measured. SEM pictures of EOS parts are also thoroughly analysed. # 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Rapid tooling; Laser sintering; Rapid prototyping

1. Introduction Rapid prototyping (RP) technology is a relatively new technology such that the three-dimensional parts can be fabricated directly from computer aided design (CAD) data without using any traditional tooling. Complex parts that cannot be manufactured by a traditional process can be produced with a very short lead-time. Some RP techniques, such as selective laser sintering and 3D printing, are able to produce metal prototypes in similar ways. Hence, a prototyped mould or a production mould can be produced utilising RP technology in one or two stages. The direct metal laser sintering (DMLS) process was developed by EOS GmbH of Munich, Germany, and has been available commercially as the EOSINT M 250 laser sintering machine since 1995 [1]. The machine is able to produce metal mould inserts within days. The process uses a laser that is directly exposed to the metal powder in liquid phase sintering. The EOS offers two powder systems: bronze-based powder and steel-based powder. Bronze-based powder is processed with no controlled atmosphere, whereas a nitrogen atmosphere was applied to the steel-based powder [2].

The EOSINT M 250 machine (Fig. 1) includes a laser unit, a control computer, a build chamber, a powder dispenser, a wiper blade and a build cylinder. A 200 W CO2 laser with a wavelength of 10.6 mm is used and its spot size is 0.3 mm. No preheating unit is required and no inert gas atmosphere is applied. CAD data were downloaded, and then slicing was done on the workstation. Multiple parts can be built in a single run. Parts were built on the steel base plate that is specially coated with bronze. Hence, the rst powder layer can be strongly bonded to the base-plate during laser sintering. EOS powder (EOSINT M Cu 3201) is a mixture of nickel, bronze and copper-phosphide material. The average grain size of the powder is 30 mm. An SEM micrograph of the powder metal is shown in Fig. 2. 2. Experiments 2.1. Part design and data preparation The part designs were generated on a Unigraphic CAD/ CAM system. The designed part has a cylinder, a hole, cones, rectangular ribs and small features. Impact test specimens were produced directly by the EOS machine. Other specimens included cylinders and rectangular blocks. These 3D solid models were exported as STL les. At the EOS

* Corresponding author. Fax: 65-779-1459. E-mail address: mpefuhyh@nus.edu.sg (J.Y.H. Fuh).

0924-0136/01/$ see front matter # 2001 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PII: S 0 9 2 4 - 0 1 3 6 ( 0 1 ) 0 0 5 8 4 - 2

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After scanning was completed, the excess powders were removed and the base plate was unscrewed. Then the loose powders were removed by using compressed air and a painting brush. Sand blasting was applied to the parts. Now the parts were ready for investigation. Epoxy inltration was then applied on some parts. 2.3. Epoxy inltration The inltration process includes two steps: epoxy penetration into the surface of the part and nal curing. A hightemperature epoxy resin was used for inltration. First the parts were pre-heated at 608C in the oven. Epoxy resin was thoroughly mixed with a hardener by using a stirrer on a hot plate so that the temperature of the epoxy mixture was maintained at 608C. Inltration was carried out at this temperature so that the viscosity of the resin was reduced, and the efciency of the process could be increased. Epoxy can be inltrated from bottom to top by capillary forces or it can be poured from the top of the parts or the parts can be dipped into a resin bath. No special method was applied in this case. The surfaces of the parts were brushed with epoxy. Epoxy was poured into the holes where brushing cannot be applied. Then the brushed parts were dried in an oven for a few minutes. Brushing and drying is repeated until the surfaces of the parts become wet even after drying in the oven. Finally, the parts were cured at 1608C in the oven for 2 h. 2.4. Measurements and tests A Carl Zeiss CMM machine was used to measure the dimensional accuracy of the parts. In this case, two parts of the same model were built for CMM measurement and one of them was inltrated with epoxy. The diameter, thickness, and height of the cylindrical features were probed. The dimensional measurements were compared with the CAD le. A Surfcom 120A surface measuring instrument was used to measure the surface roughness. Surface proles of untreated and inltrated parts were measured along the X, Y and Z-axis. An Avery-Denison Charpy was used to measure the impact toughness of the directly built specimens. An Instron 8501 tensile test machine was used to measure the transverse rupture strength (TRS). Specimens for TRS test were prepared according to ASTM B 528-98. An Akashi AR-10 hardness tester was used to measure the hardness. Before measuring, rectangular-shaped specimens were grounded to get the plane surfaces. Several measurements were taken on the same surface of each specimen. A LabX XRD-6000 Shimadzu X-ray diffractometer was used to get the XRD patterns of EOS powder and parts. A JSM-5600 LV scanning electron microscope was used to take the SEM micrographs of EOS parts and the EDX spectrum. The specimens were carefully grounded, polished and lightly etched. The enchant was a solution of distilled water, hydrochloric acid and Iron III chloride.

Fig. 1. A schematic diagram of the EOS machine.

workstation, the parts were placed together using PlaserTM. They were then sliced using SlicerTM to get a set of 2D layer data. The layer thickness was maintained at 50 mm. There were different scanning and hatching styles available in the computer. Using a skin and core exposure process, the internal area of the part was built more quickly. The slicing le (SLI format) was exported to the EOS control PC. Processing parameters such as the shrinkage compensation were also determined. 2.2. Fabrication The base plate was screwed onto the platform before scanning. The base-plate levelling was done manually. First, the laser beam was scanned on the base plate without any powder deposited on it. Hence, the coated bronze melt was bonded very well to the mild steel base plate. Then the powder was deposited on the rst layer. Subsequently, the laser was scanned according to the slice data. A skin and core scanning process was applied, and the internal area of the part could be built more quickly. The process continued until a 3D part was completed.

Fig. 2. An SEM picture of EOS powder.

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3. Results and discussions To save material, the size of the testing part is small and the design is simple. Delamination between the base plate and the part was observed. In this regard, the humidity of the environment affects the sintering process. The quality of the bronze coating may affect the bonding between the base plate and the part. Levelling of the base plate, which was achieved manually, is also important. If the plate is not levelled, the deposited powder on top of the plate will be uneven. It was found that the dimensional errors along the axis were ranging from 0.003 to 0.082 mm. The average deviations were 0.043 mm in the X-axis, 0.018 mm in the Yaxis and 0.025 mm in the Z-axis. The values along the Y-axis were the most accurate. Obviously, different amounts of inaccuracy were found in the X-axis and Y-axis. Moreover, signicant inaccuracy was found in the diameters of the cylindrical feature, ranging from 0.025 to 0.34 mm. This value may be unacceptable for tooling applications. Instead of a circular shape, an oval shape formation of the sintered part resulted in a large variation in the cylindrical features. Unequal shrinkage in the X and Y directions may have caused the circular prole of the parts to be distorted. The accuracy of the optical unit provided is crucial. The hardness of the sintered parts ranged from 26 to 33 Rockwell B scale (HR B). That of the inltrated part increased to 6569 HR B. By applying the low-melting point inltration of material such as silver or leadtin alloy, the hardness can be improved, but the process becomes more complex. The EOS machine directly produced the impact test specimen with the notch representing 458 and 2 mm depth. The impact toughness of the untreated sintered parts was 4 J, which is considered quite low. That of the inltrated parts is almost the same. The value is close to that of magnesium alloy. The roughness values (Ra) of untreated parts were about 1216 mm. The surface roughness of inltrated parts ranged from 4 to 7 mm, which is comparable to a rough EDM surface. With a standard manual polishing, a roughness of Ra < 1 mm is possible [3]. Inltration was done manually. The quality of the inltrated surface was highly dependent on human judgement. Inltration improves the surface smoothness but degrades the thermal conductivity of the part [4]. The density of the EOS parts was measured in water and air. The average density of EOS parts was 6.264 g/cm3 and that of EOS parts with inltration was slightly increased to 6.325 g/cm3. The porosity of the fabricated parts without epoxy inltration could be from 30 to 45% depending on the process conditions. The average TRS was 293.23 MPa. This value would decrease as the porosity of the sintered part increased because of the presence of voids in the microstructure, as shown in Figs. 3 and 4. The initial cracks will thus require less force to break. An optical micrograph (Fig. 3) revealed the scanning lines with pores. In Figs. 3 and 4 bright irregular shapes represent

Fig. 3. Optical micrograph.

Fig. 4. An SEM micrograph.

nickel and the brown circular shapes were the unmelted bronze. The black spaces are pores. Laser sintered parts are always porous. The scanning method strongly affects the scanning time, part properties and accuracy. During sintering, bronze was supposed to be melted by the laser at a certain temperature. Smaller particles have more tendencies to melt. Because the larger particle has a higher melting enthalpy due to the large mass, it will be less susceptible to melting [5]. Porosity was revealed in the SEM micrographs (Fig. 4). The Cu and phosphorus matrix formed was wetted to nickel very well. The EOS powder was investigated with EDX and the results are shown in Table 1 and Fig. 5. In the EDX

Table 1 Volumetric composition of the EOS powder Element P Ni Cu Sn % element 0.54 1.74 1.99 1.26

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4. Conclusions The EOS direct laser sintering process was able to produce 3D metal parts with very ne details, but the sintered parts were relatively soft, rough and porous. Optimisation of the process parameters and the working accuracy of the optical units was crucial to improve the part quality and accuracy. Powder handling and humidity control of the working area are important for better process control. The experience and skill of the operator plays an important role in building a good part. Low melting point inltration using silver alloy can improve the hardness. Nickel plating would be an option to improve the hardness and wear resistance of the parts. In order to get a better strength, a new material system has to be further developed. References
[1] A. Lohner, Laser sintering ushers in new route to PM parts, Metal Powder Rep. 52 (2) (1997) 2427. [2] T. Wohlers, Rapid Prototyping and Tooling State of the Industry: 1999 Worldwide Progress Report, Wohlers Associates, Inc., 1999. [3] C. Wilkening, Fast production of technical prototypes using direct laser sintering of metals and foundry sand, in: B. Bennet (Ed.), Proceedings of the Second International Conference on Development in Rapid Prototyping and Tooling, 1997, pp. 153160. [4] Y.-A. Song, Experimental study of the basic process mechanism for direct selective laser sintering of low-melting metallic powder, Ann. CIRP, Manufacturing Technol. 46 (1997) 127130. [5] M.A.D. Bourell, J. Beaman, H. Marcus, J. Barlow, Direct selective laser sintering metals, Rapid Prototyping J. 1 (1) (1995) 2636.

Fig. 5. EDX results.

Fig. 6. XRD patterns.

results, most of the region was lled with Cu, in which the diffusion of Cu from bronze particle to the matrix was found. The XRD patterns are shown in Fig. 6.