Innovative Approach to Evaluate the Mechanical Performance of Ti–6Al–4V Lattice Structures Produced by Electron Beam Melting Process

Abstract

Additive manufacturing processes allow producing complex geometries which include structures with enhanced mechanical performance and biomimetic properties. Among these structures, the interests on the use of lattice are increasing for both medical and mechanical applications. The mechanical behaviour of the structure is closely correlated to its shape and dimension. However, up to now, far too little attention has been paid to this aspect. Hence, this work aims to explore the effect of geometry, dimension and relative density of the cell structure on the compressive strength of specimens with lattice structures. For this purpose, various Lattice structures are designed with different geometries and dimensions. This approach leads to having structures with different relativity densities. Replicas of the designed structure are produced using Ti–6Al–4V powder processed by electron beam melting process. The samples are tested under compression. A new approach to calculate the absorbed energy up to failure by the lattice structure is presented. The results show a close relationship between the mechanical performance of the structure and the investigated parameters. In contrast with the current literature, the presented experimental data and a collection of the literature data highlight that the lattice structures with similar relative density do not exhibit the same Young’s modulus values.