Subproject B3 – Research System

The research system of the Collaborative Research Centre 814 – Additive Manufacturing is a self-established and almost freely parameterizable and temperature-stabilized laser beam melting system.

It allows for a homogeneous temperature distribution on the building space, which is a basic requirement for the fabrication process guaranteed by an eight-zone IR surface heating system. The maximum build chamber temperature is 230°C, which enables the processing of plastics with higher melting temperatures. The scanning system is state of the art and guarantees short acceleration times as well as high precision in beam guiding. The integrated f-theta lens of the laser system enables constant intensity distributions almost over the entire build chamber surface of 350 x 350 mm2. The maximum build height is 500 mm. The focus diameter of the CO2 laser is 400 µm and the maximum nominal power is 50 W.

The research system has a wide range of additional equipment, which is used especially for process analysis and processing of new powder materials in small quantities. Thus, different setups can be integrated into the system, which make it possible to reduce the installation space and to control the temperature. In addition, a reduction of the powder storage container is available, too. Different recoating geometries are available for powder application, e.g. different blade geometries or a counter rotating roller. Furthermore, for the observation of the thermal boundary conditions and the exposure process as well as the melt pool formation an infrared camera system can be integrated into the research system.

This high-end adaptable research system is used to answer the most complex questions regarding laser sintering of polymers.