Additive Manufacturing of Fuel Injectors
- Edison Welding Institute, Inc., Columbus, OH (United States)
- Solar Turbines Inc., San Diego, CA (United States)
Additive manufacturing (AM), also known as 3D-printing, has been shifting from a novelty prototyping paradigm to a legitimate manufacturing tool capable of creating components for highly complex engineered products. An emerging AM technology for producing metal parts is the laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) process; however, industry manufacturing specifications and component design practices for L-PBF have not yet been established. Solar Turbines Incorporated (Solar), an industrial gas turbine manufacturer, has been evaluating AM technology for development and production applications with the desire to enable accelerated product development cycle times, overall turbine efficiency improvements, and supply chain flexibility relative to conventional manufacturing processes (casting, brazing, welding). Accordingly, Solar teamed with EWI on a joint two-and-a-half-year project with the goal of developing a production L-PBF AM process capable of consistently producing high-nickel alloy material suitable for high temperature gas turbine engine fuel injector components. The project plan tasks were designed to understand the interaction of the process variables and their combined impact on the resultant AM material quality. The composition of the high-nickel alloy powders selected for this program met the conventional cast Hastelloy X compositional limits and were commercially available in different particle size distributions (PSD) from two suppliers. Solar produced all the test articles and both EWI and Solar shared responsibility for analyzing them. The effects of powder metal input stock, laser parameters, heat treatments, and post-finishing methods were evaluated. This process knowledge was then used to generate tensile, fatigue, and creep material properties data curves suitable for component design activities. The key process controls for ensuring consistent material properties were documented in AM powder and process specifications. The basic components of the project were: • Powder metal input stock: Powder characterization, dimensional accuracy, metallurgical characterization, and mechanical properties evaluation. • Process parameters: Laser parameter effects, post-printing heat-treatment development, mechanical properties evaluation, and post-finishing technique. • Material design curves: Room and elevated temperature tensiles, low cycle fatigue, and creep rupture properties curves generated. • AM specifications: Key metal powder characteristics, laser parameters, and heat-treatment controls identified.
- Research Organization:
- Edison Welding Institute, Inc., Columbus, OH (United States)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Fossil Energy (FE)
- DOE Contract Number:
- FE0023974
- OSTI ID:
- 1406179
- Report Number(s):
- 55232GTH
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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Related Subjects
42 ENGINEERING
96 KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT AND PRESERVATION
AM
Additive Manufacturing
3D printing
Hastelloy X
high Nickel
EWI
Edison Welding Institute
Solar Turbines
L-PBF
laser powder bed fusion
laser process parameters
metallurgical characterization
gas turbine fuel injectors
heat treatment
computed tomography
radiographic testing
low cycle fatigue
tensile
high cycle fatigue