Abstract:
Selective laser melting (SLM) of titanium alloys is an important manufacturing method applied in fields such as aerospace and biomedicine. However, it still faces challenges related to high costs and quality. For a specific topology-optimized bracket design, three placement configurations were proposed and four support structures were developed. Through Simufact Additive software simulations and SLM prototyping, the effects of horizontal block supports, vertical upright supports, vertical inverted supports, solid supports, vertical upright e-stage+columnar supports, and e-stage supports on SLM manufacturing processes were investigated. The results show that the maximum surface deviations for different support schemes are 1.6724 mm, 0.1446 mm, 0.4399 mm, -0.2412 mm, -0.1942 mm, 0.1631 mm, and the support masses are 45.9 g, 29.6 g, 93.9 g, 35.2 g, 6.8 g, 5.9 g, respectively. Compared to the vertical upright block support, the vertical upright e-stage support reduces the support area by 60.4% and decreases the support mass by 80.1%. When the laser power is set to 250 W, scanning speed to 1000 mm/s, powder layer thickness to 50 μm, and scanning spacing to 0.11 mm, the positive and negative deviations of the parts can be controlled within 0.3 mm.