Process-part CO-design and qualification for laser powder bed fusion

The University of Wisconsin System was awarded a $9,100,000 Project Grant from the Department of the Navy's Office of Naval Research under the Basic and Applied Scientific Research (CFDA 12.300) federal grant program. The grant, awarded on July 1, 2024, will fund research and development to develop a scalable path-to-part thermal simulation for laser powder bed fusion (PBF) additive manufacturing processes. Key objectives include:

1. Developing a calibrated thermal simulation prototype to predict thermally-induced measures like distortions and residual stresses in PBF-manufactured components.

2. Integrating the PBF thermal simulation with mechanical simulation to enable end-to-end thermo-mechanical modeling of the manufacturing process.

3. Testing the simulation tools on realistic PBF components in collaboration with the Navy, University of Wisconsin-Madison, and GE research teams.

4. Investigating the feasibility of using the simulation tools for model-based feedforward control and optimization to improve the quality of PBF-manufactured parts.

As a sub-award under this project, Intact Solutions, Inc. will receive funding to provide research and development services related to the thermal simulation and optimization capabilities.