Characterization of Mechanical Properties of 3-D–Printed Materials Using the Asymmetric Four-Point Bending Test and Virtual Fields Method

The virtual fields method (VFM) is an inverse method for characterizing the mechanical properties of materials that has the advantage that all constitutive parameters can be identified using one test. The accuracy of identification is mainly determined by the load configuration, deformation measurement, and virtual displacement fields. In order to promote the use of VFM, a new load configuration for the asymmetric four-point bending (4PB) test is proposed here. A virtual experiment was performed to examine the feasibility of the asymmetric 4PB test, where the configuration of the proposed test was optimized to achieve high identification accuracy. As an example of a practical application, the proposed method combined with moire interferometry was used to characterize the constitutive parameters of stainless-steel materials fabricated by selective laser-melting 3-D printing. It was demonstrated that this method is suitable for characterizing the material properties of 3-D–printed materials.