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Maraging steel powder recycling effect on the tensile and fatigue behavior of parts produced through the laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) process

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Abstract

Additive manufacturing (AM) has advanced the manufacturing industry and has been employed in a wide range of industrial applications, including aerospace, automotive, medical, and die-casting equipment. To ensure the cost-effectiveness of the AM process, unfused powder must be recycled even if its characteristics may change after each cycle, making essential the validation of powder quality and component mechanical performances. Despite the research published to date, predicting the mechanical performance of printed parts issued from reused powder remains challenging since it is dependent on many AM process variables. Until now, no research has looked at the impact of powder recycling on the fatigue behavior of maraging steel components. This study investigates the impact of maraging steel powder reuse on powder characteristics, as well as on the tensile and fatigue properties of printed components. Our results indicate that the powder particle size distribution increased after eight powder reuses, particle morphology showed the presence of aggregates, broken particles, and shattered and deformed particles, while powder apparent density remained constant. Powder reusing had no significant impact on the surface roughness of as-built specimens. Although there was a slight decrease in mechanical properties over reuse cycles, tensile and fatigue performance remained globally stable, while the standard deviation of fatigue stress became narrower after eight cycles. Finally, fractography revealed that the fatigue fracture surfaces of components manufactured from an eight-time recycled powder have more fusion defects and carbon inclusions than the parts made from virgin powder.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to express their appreciation for the support provided by Jonathan Coudé, Farhadipour Pedram, Karel J. Uhlir, Charles-André Fraser, Dany Morin, Richard Lafrance, and Loubert Suzie for their assistance during this project.

Funding

This research was funded by NSERC, grant CDEPJ/507533.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département de mathématiques, d’informatique et de génie, Université du Québec À Rimouski, 300 Allée Des Ursulines, Rimouski, QC, G5L 3A1, Canada

    Othmane Rayan, Jean Brousseau & Abderrazak El Ouafi

  2. Institut Des Sciences de La Mer de Rimouski (ISMER), Université du Québec À Rimouski, 310 Allée Des Ursulines, Rimouski, QC, G5L 3A1, Canada

    Claude Belzile

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  1. Othmane Rayan
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  2. Jean Brousseau
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Contributions

The novel ideas and work plan were established by Othmane Rayan and Jean Brousseau to meet the study objectives. Powder particles size, powder morphology, and fractography analysis were performed by Othmane Rayan, Claude Belzile, and Jonathan Coudé. The design, fabrication, and testing were performed by Othmane Rayan and Jean Brousseau. Abderazak El ouafi contributed to manuscript drafting and correcting. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Othmane Rayan.

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Rayan, O., Brousseau, J., Belzile, C. et al. Maraging steel powder recycling effect on the tensile and fatigue behavior of parts produced through the laser powder bed fusion (L-PBF) process. Int J Adv Manuf Technol 127, 1737–1754 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00170-023-11522-x

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