Uncertainty quantification of microstructure variability and mechanical behaviour of additively manufactured lattice structures

TL;DR

This paper introduces a CT-based random field model combined with the Finite Cell Method to efficiently quantify how microstructural variability affects the mechanical behavior of additively manufactured lattice structures, validated by experimental data.

Contribution

It presents a novel stochastic modeling approach for microstructure variability in metal lattices, enabling efficient mechanical analysis of AM structures considering process-induced defects.

Findings

The model accurately predicts mechanical behavior variations.

Numerical results align well with experimental data.

Insights into process effects on geometrical and mechanical variability.

Abstract

Process-induced defects are the leading cause of discrepancies between as-designed and as-manufactured additive manufacturing (AM) product behavior. Especially for metal lattices, the variations in the printed geometry cannot be neglected. Therefore, the evaluation of the influence of microstructural variability on their mechanical behavior is crucial for the quality assessment of the produced structures. Commonly, the as-manufactured geometry can be obtained by computed tomography (CT). However, to incorporate all process-induced defects into the numerical analysis is often computationally demanding. Thus, commonly this task is limited to a predefined set of considered variations, such as strut size or strut diameter. In this work, a CT-based binary random field is proposed to generate statistically equivalent geometries of periodic metal lattices. The proposed random field model in combination with the Finite Cell Method (FCM), an immersed boundary method, allows to efficiently evaluate the influence of the underlying microstructure on the variability of the mechanical behavior of AM products. Numerical analysis of two lattices manufactured at different scales shows an excellent agreement with experimental data. Furthermore, it provides a unique insight into the effects of the process on the occurring geometrical variations and final mechanical behavior.