SFA-AM - Strategic Focus Area Advanced Manufacturing
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PREAMPA

PREcision Additive Manufacturing of Precious metals Alloys
Selective laser melting (SLM) is a powder bed additive manufacturing (AM) technology which allows building components from an alloy powder with complex 3D geometries layer by layer. The application of this technology to precious metals based alloys has been shown to face several challenges, related to their particular combination of optical, thermal and mechanical properties. Resulting parts are notoriously porous, and have low dimensionnal accuracy.
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Machine combining Selective Laser Melting (SLM) and Laser Shock Peening (LSP), Source: EPFL
The project consortium aims to improve significantly the processing of these alloys by using lasers with different wavelengths, changing the reflectivity of powders through sacrificial coating and combining the SLM process with a Laser Shock Peening (LSP) treatment. These efforts will be complemented by the development of novel methods for the control and measurement of residual stresses, which are a major cause of process failure and geometrical distortions.

Scope of Research Activities
Material development
  • Cataloguing precious metal alloys candidates for Selective Laser Melting (SLM),
    including metallic glasses and high entropy alloys
  • Alloying with trace elements
  • Sacrificial coating of metal powders
SLM process development
  • SLM with selected alloys
  • Process development using two lasers with different wavelengths
  • In situ monitoring based on acoustic emissions for defects detection
  • Reflective anisotropy spectroscopy (RAS) for residual stress mapping
  • Combination of SLM with Laser Shock Peening (LSP)
Advanced in situ and ex situ characterization
  • Quantification of porosities and cracks
  • Residual stresses, crystallographic phases, texture 
  • Crystallinity, local structure, pair distribution function, excess free volume
  • In situ fast heating and cooling, in situ SLM

Key Technical Problems to Solve
  • The high reflectivity and thermal conductivity of PMs makes them difficult to be consolidated by standard SLM, and parts are often porous and rough with a rather poor reproducibility.
  • Residual stresses that build up during SLM reduce the geometrical accuracy and may lead to damage / cracking, which prevents some alloys to be considered as potential candidates for mm to cm parts.
  • The good combination of hardness and ductility is often not obtained with standard precious alloys, and traditional thermomechanical treatments.

Demonstrators
  • Small cubes
  • Little cylinders (on which compression tests can be performed)
  • Parts representative of the challenges faced by the watch industry

Leading Principal Investigator
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Prof. Dr. Roland Logé
Laboratory of Thermomechanical Metallurgy, EPF Lausanne

Project Consortium
  • Dr. Christian Leinenbach, Laboratory for Advanced Materials Processing, Empa
  • Prof. Dr. Jörg F. Löffler, Laboratory of Metal Physics and Technology, ETH Zürich
  • Prof. Dr. Ralph Spolenak, Laboratory of Nanometallurgy, ETH Zürich
  • Prof. Dr. Helena Van Swygenhoven, Photons for Engineering and Manufacturing Group, PSI
  • Dr. Antonia Neels, Center for X-Ray Analytics, Empa
An initiative of the ETH Board
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Participating Institutions of the ETH Domain
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  • Home
  • Focus Areas
    • Focus Areas 2017-2020 >
      • Precision Free-Form Manufacturing
      • Printed Electronics
      • Sustainable Digital Manufacturing and Design
      • Sensing Technologies
      • Intelligent Systems and Advanced Automation
    • Focus Areas 2021-2024 >
      • Manufacturing Technologies
      • Functionality Integration
      • Sensing Technologies
      • Intelligent Systems and Advanced Automation
  • Calls & Selection
    • Initial Program
    • Expansion Program
    • Period 2021-2024
  • Projects
    • Projects Initial Program >
      • Ceramic X.0
      • FUORCLAM
      • Powder Focusing
      • PREAMPA
      • FOXIP
      • CFRP-AM
      • SD4D
    • Projects Expansion Program >
      • D-SENSE
      • MOCONT
      • Nano Assembly
      • X-Ray Diagnostics
  • Events
    • Annual Review Meeting 2020 >
      • Annual Review Meeting 2020 Registration
    • Workshop 13 July 2020
    • Annual Review Meeting 2019
    • Annual Review Meeting 2018
    • Launch Event 13 Nov 2017
    • Workshop 6 July 2017
    • Workshop 17 Oct 2016
  • About
    • Steering Committee
    • Participating ETH Institutions
  • Contact