Improving surface roughness of polylactic acid (PLA) products manufactured by 3D printing using a novel slurry impact technique

Abstract

Purpose

Fused deposition modeling (FDM) is one of the most adopted additive manufacturing techniques to produce prototypes and/or final parts regardless of geometrical complexity restrictions. One of the most challenging aspects of this technology is the attainable roughness. The purpose of this study is to evaluate the capability of the slurry impacts to improve the surface roughness of parts fabricated using FDM. Moreover, a regression model for predicting the values of surface roughness was developed.

Design/methodology/approach

The developed technique imposes a silica–water mixture which softens the staircase on the surface and leaves it smoother. The process introduces three main factors: building orientation; layer thickness; and impact angle of the slurry particles. Experimentally, a test rig was used to evaluate the effect of these factors on surface roughness. Statistically, Analysis of variance (ANOVA) and regression analysis were conducted to study the contribution of the individual factors on the roughness.

Findings

The results reveal that the effect of slurry impacts has a good impact on surface roughness, and the three factors have significant effect on surface roughness.

Originality/value

This paper contributes to new knowledge by providing a new technique for enhancing the surface roughness of FDMed products. ANOVA and regression analysis is a useful tool to parametrically study the surface roughness in terms of building and testing factors.

Citation

Heshmat, M. and Abdelrhman, Y. (2021), "Improving surface roughness of polylactic acid (PLA) products manufactured by 3D printing using a novel slurry impact technique", Rapid Prototyping Journal, Vol. 27 No. 10, pp. 1791-1800. https://doi.org/10.1108/RPJ-09-2020-0227