Open AccessManufacturable Gradient-Variable Cellular Structures Design
Author(s) -
Gang Li,
Yuan Yao
Publication year - 2019
Publication title -
iop conference series. materials science and engineering
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
eISSN - 1757-899X
pISSN - 1757-8981
DOI - 10.1088/1757-899x/692/1/012010
Subject(s) - design for manufacturability , topology optimization , topology (electrical circuits) , process (computing) , variable (mathematics) , computer science , field (mathematics) , engineering drawing , mechanical engineering , engineering , mathematics , structural engineering , finite element method , mathematical analysis , pure mathematics , electrical engineering , operating system
Topology optimization (TO) has been widely used in the field of additive manufacturing (AM), but the structure designed by the density-based optimization method has obvious material gradient and complex internal structures, which are difficult to be directly manufactured with specific process. This paper proposes a multi-scale design method for designing cellular structure with topology optimization. Firstly, micro units with variable density are designed to support smooth interconnections. Then, we provide a assembling method to generate models with density distributions similar to topology optimization method, while guarantee the manufacturability of the structures. The experimental results show that the generated model does not need support in fabrication, and retains the optimized mechanical properties, which can be used as a TO based fill pattern for 3D printing.