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Topology optimization of multi-phase shell-infill composite structure for additive manufacturing

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Abstract

This paper presents a topology optimization method for a multi-phase shell-infill composite, accounting for the coated shell and graded multi-phase microstructural infill. The method builds upon extended multi-phase density-based topology optimization approaches, and it consists of two major steps: (1) general structural configuration design of the shell-base composite structure and (2) detailed design of the graded multi-phase infill architecture. An erosion-based interface identification method is adopted to evolve the general structural configuration with a coated shell. Then the maximum and minimum length scale control constraints are simultaneously imposed on each phase material to generate graded multi-phase porous structures in the base region. The whole design process is performed on a full-size finite element analysis and only involves standard filtering operations. It avoids the separation of scales and guarantees the connectivity of microstructures. Several numerical examples for minimum compliance are presented, and a post-processing method is proposed to smooth the design boundaries when extracting CAD models for additive manufacturing. Eventually, the manufacturability of the post-processed prototype is verified with a multi-material 3D printer, which further illustrates the applicability of the proposed method.

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The raw/processed data required to reproduce these findings cannot be shared at this time as the data also forms part of an ongoing study.

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Acknowledgements

This research is partially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52075195), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities through Program no. 2172019kfyXJJS078 and 2019kfyXKJC042, and the Program for HUST Academic Frontier Youth Team (No. 2017QYTD04).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Lab of Digital Manufacturing Equipment and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430074, China

    Hang Li, Hao Li, Liang Gao, Jiajing Li & Peigen Li

  2. School of Mechanical and Automotive Engineering, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou, 510641, China

    Yongfeng Zheng

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  1. Hang Li
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Correspondence to Liang Gao.

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Li, H., Li, H., Gao, L. et al. Topology optimization of multi-phase shell-infill composite structure for additive manufacturing. Engineering with Computers 40, 1049–1064 (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00366-023-01837-4

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