Additive Manufacturing

WELDENG 5027 Introduction to Additive Manufacturing (3 cr hrs)

This course introduces the modern Additive Manufacturing (AM) technology applied to a wide variety of materials while focusing on metal AM. The course covers the history, fundamentals, applications, processes, and materials science associated with AM technology.

Course Learning Objectives:
Provide an introduction to the fundamental concepts and the application of additive manufacturing (AM), including:

1. History

2. Fundamentals

3. The processes steps

4. Design for AM

5. A description of the most common AM processes for polymers, ceramics, and metals

6. The most relevant parameters for metal AM and other aspects such as feedstock, defect formation, modeling and microstructure evolution, and microstructure engineering

7. Applications, advantages, and disadvantages of AM; 6. Recent advances in AM and the future of this technology

MATSCEN 5655 Additive Manufacturing for Bio-Medical Devices (3 cr hrs)

Survey of Additive Manufacturing (AM) patient data acquisition and medical device Computer Aided Design (CAD), medical research and clinical grade AM materials and AM fabrication methods, quality assurance/management systems and regulatory (FDA) approval process. Click here to learn more about MATSCEN 5655. 

ME 6194 Design for Additive Manufacturing (3 cr hrs)

This course is typically offered every other spring. Please contact program staff for information on next offering. 

This is a Graduate-level course that will focus on the field of design for additive manufacturing also known as 3D printing. The course will use design-based problems, and project-based learning (hands-on) to aid students in developing the design and research skills required to function within the area of design for additive manufacturing. As a student in this course, you will be expected to gain understanding and skillsets in computer-aided design (CAD) with 3D printing, manufacturing, and research knowledge. (Prior CAD experience required for this course)

The course will focus both on novel design tools that are integrated into the AM process and also on restrictive manufacturability constraints that impact the design methods. We will explore a variety of AM systems starting from small desktop FDM scale to high-end industry-level AM. In this course, we will also explore the important pertinent research questions related to the design of AM.

Learning Outcomes:

By the end of this course, students should successfully be able to:

1. Understand the interplay between design methods and additive manufacturing process.
2. Apply prevalent design for additive manufacturing approaches and frameworks to design and analyze problems.
3. Learn novel conceptual design flow that are tailored for design for additive manufacturing to enhance the quality of the product.
4. Quantify and incorporate restrictive design approaches to the design flow.
5. Identify the keys areas/questions for future research to advance AM design techniques.

WELDENG 7115 Computational Modeling of Additive Manufacturing (3 cr hrs)

Topics include theory of temperature, stress, deformation, phase transformation during additive manufacturing and welding, as well as application of industry-standard simulation codes.

Course Learning Objectives 

By the end of this course, students will have the ability to:

1. Solve heat conduction problems using the finite difference method and the finite element method.

2. Analyze bar-frame problems to determine the evolution of thermal-stress and formation of residual stress.

3. Set up thermomechanical simulations using an industry-standard finite element program, run the simulation job, and report the calculated results.

4. Determine phase equilibria from Gibbs free energy curves.

5. Calculate thermal-physical properties using an industry-standard computational thermodynamics program.

6. Calculate phase transformation kinetics using an industry-standard diffusion program.

ME 6194 Science and Engineering Foundations of Additive Manufacturing (3 cr hrs)

This graduate-level course focuses on the scientific and engineering principles that govern material addition and consolidation in additive manufacturing processes.  The class has a particular focus on heat transfer and fluid mechanics physics, as these physical principles govern important thermal processes such as powder bed fusion, directed energy deposition, and material extrusion.  The overarching objective of the course is to assist graduate students in researching additive manufacturing processes to better understand the physical principles of their research.

Course objectives:

Objective 1: Apply the basic physics and engineering principles of additive manufacturing: heat transfer, engineering mechanics, materials consolidation, systems integration and control, and experiment design.

Objective 2: Apply ordinary and partial differential equations to problems in AM.

Objective 3: Apply and then analyze first-principles AM simulation and modeling tools.

Objective 4: Apply the physics of the key failure modes in AM processes and then analyze failure case studies.

Objective 5: Design an experiment to understand basic process-structure-performance relationships in AM.