Design for metal AM - a beginner's guide feature
Summary
Additive manufacturing (AM) gives us tremendous freedom to create components with free-form and intricate features, direct from CAD and without the need for expensive tooling. These complex designs would be impractical, if not impossible, to produce conventionally. Additive components are often lighter, more efficient and better adapted to their application.
The article guides the AM designer on how to:
- Minimise residual stress
- Design for best practice orientation
- Use primary and secondary supports for AM
- Optimise the AM part
