Additive Manufacturing is enabling the casting of complex geometries directly from digital design data and including 3D-scanned and reversed-engineered structures and even functionally-graded lattices. By inkjetting binder into a bed of sand layer-by-layer, dimensionally-precise sand molds and cores can be printed to serve as soft tooling for sand casting. However, the related increase in geometry complexity can lead to challenges in ensuring casting quality and yield. One recently-explored remedy is to introduce sensors (the Internet of Things) to enable the collection of a diversity of data at difficult-to-access locations in molds and includes measuring temperature, pressure, moisture, and detecting core shift. This webinar will describe work in wirelessly measuring temperature, humidity, magnetic field, metal velocity, and most recently, in barometric pressure, to monitor the pressures that accumulate within cores due to binder decomposition. New ventilation designs and strategies - enabled with complex, 3D printed fluidic channels - can now be explored.
Presenter Eric MacDonald, Ph.D., is a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Youngstown State University. MacDonald co-founded a start-up specializing in CAD software that was later acquired by a firm in Silicon Valley. His research interests include 3D printed multi-functional applications and closed-loop control in additive manufacturing, with instrumentation and computer vision for improved quality and yield. MacDonald is also an engineer in the state of Texas.
This AFS Members Only Webinar will begin at 1 PM CT.