Real-time multiscale prediction of structural performance in material extrusion additive manufacturing

Abstract The material extrusion additive manufacturing (AM) has been extensively used in fabricating structures with complex geometries. However, geometric defects often exist in an AM structure, which could compromise its final performance. In this paper, a real-time multiscale performance evaluation method is developed for material extrusion-based honeycomb structures. The representative cell boundary is extracted from three-dimensional (3D) point clouds obtained via an in-situ monitoring approach. The cell boundary is then used to generate the digital twin of the unit cell of the printed layer based on the finite element (FE) method. A physics-based multiscale modeling approach called mechanics of structure genome (MSG) is then employed to predict the effective material properties of the printed layer and plate stiffness matrix of the final structure. The proposed approach provides a highly efficient way to predict the real-time performance of the as-manufactured products. Moreover, the numerical example shows that the geometric defects could result in complex mechanical behaviors in the defected parts, which cannot be captured by the conventional approaches based on the comparison of the shape deviations. The numerical results are validated by the three-point bending tests. The proposed method can be used in the closed-loop control of material extrusion-based manufacturing systems.