Investigation of effects on Wire additive manufactured aluminum of different welding/shielding gas combinations

Abstract

Additive manufacturing is allocated an important role in the future for the so-called industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution. This technology promises highly efficient production of parts with savings in material, scrap and machining waste products like shavings. Furthermore, the computer aided design combined with these processes make complex features available and therefor more possibilities for engineers to develop machinery, products and equipment needed for still difficult tasks or those tasks still ahead. But for this bright future of this technology to come to pass and for the technology to have the impact that is promised, there needs to be a better understanding for the process and its parameters, also the design for additive manufacturing needs to be developed and implemented in the broader industry. For metals there are already different material forms available to experiment and produce with. One of those technologies to produce metal parts is directed energy deposition -wire-arc. As the name suggests the used material is wire molten with an arc welding technology. In welding one important need is the shielding of the molten material from the contaminants and reactive atmosphere around. As the gases are also impacting the process behavior and are reported to impact the resulting material it is important to not dismiss the opportunity to implement the shielding gas as another parameter for the process. Within this work a small summary of the additive manufacturing processes available for metal part production shall be given as well as some metallurgy basics with regards to aluminum as it is used in this work. In this work the effects of the gas on welded aluminum is investigated experimentally and discussed to find possible gas combinations and to further increase the understanding of the process by summarizing the results of the investigation.

Date of Award	2025
Original language	English
Supervisor	Carina Maria Schlögl (Supervisor)