Research on Surface Roughness of AlSi10Mg Parts Fabricated by Laser Powder Bed Fusion

AlSi10Mg cubes were fabricated with the laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) process, using different exposure times and scan strategies to gain insight into the effect of energy density and part orientation on surface roughness. The results showed that, with increasing energy density, the five-face roughness first decreased and then increased, whereas the top roughness increased slightly. Moreover, considerable differences in roughness appeared for the different faces. A good surface quality was obtained at 175 J/mm(3) and 200 J/mm(3) when the rotation start angle and rotation increment angle were set as 0 in meander scan mode. The roughness variation was caused by the scan direction, gas flow direction, and wiper movement direction. The scan strategies with rotation increments of 90 degrees effectively narrowed the variation. These results support direct part orientation and placement and can guide users to further reduce roughness through process optimisation or simplification of post-processing procedures.