The Impact of Geometric Complexity on Printing Time and Cost for Additive Manufacturing (AM) Process

Abstract

AbstractAdditive manufacturing (AM) process are known by the capability to produce complex parts for various sorts of materials (polymers, ceramics, and metals). This family of processes is growing rapidly, and it is the origin of important research activity (dimensional deviations, capability prediction, biomedical applications, etc.). AM technologies provide greater freedom in the design and construction of complex shapes. Many researchers promoted that in AM this complexity is without an increase of the cost because there is no need for additional tooling. In traditional manufacturing processes such as injection molding, there is a direct relationship between geometric complexity and cost. But, the impact of geometric complexity on the production time and Cost of additive Manufacturing technology has not gained significant attention. In this work, we demonstrate the influence of geometric complexity on printing time and cost for additive manufacturing process and dispute the existing hypothesis that additive manufacturing techniques offer complexity with no extra cost. The Results of this paper demonstrates how geometric complexity raises the printing time and the manufacturing cost.KeywordsAdditive manufacturing processGeometric complexityDesign optimizationBuilding timeCosting