Finite element analysis of the rapid manufacturing of Ti-6Al-4V parts by laser powder deposition

The overlapping of layers during part build-up in rapid manufacturing by laser powder deposition (LPD) causes consecutive thermal cycles in the previously deposited material that often lead to complex phase transformations and difficult to predict distributions of microstructure and properties. In this paper a model coupling finite element heat transfer calculations, phase transformation kinetics and microstructure property relations in Ti-6Al-4V is presented and used to obtain processing maps relating the deposition parameters to the microstructure and properties of the parts. (C) 2010 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.