Characterization of Viscoelastic Properties of a Material Used for an Additive Manufacturing Method

Recent development of additive manufacturing technologies has led to lack of information on the base materials being used. A need arises to know the mechanical behaviors of these base materials so that it can be linked with macroscopic mechanical behaviors of 3D network structures manufactured from the 3D printer. The main objectives of my research are to characterize properties of a material for an additive manufacturing method (commonly referred to as 3D printing). Also, to model viscoelastic properties of Procast material that is obtained from 3D printer. For this purpose, a 3D CAD model is made using ProE and 3D printed using Projet HD3500. Series of uniaxial tensile tests, creep tests, and dynamic mechanical analysis are carried out to obtained viscoelastic behavior of Procast. Test data is fitted using various linear and nonlinear viscoelastic models. Validation of model is also carried out using tensile test data and frequency sweep data. Various other mechanical characterization have also been carried out in order to find density, melting temperature, glass transition temperature, and strain rate dependent elastic modulus of Procast material. It can be concluded that melting temperature of Procast material is around 337°C, the elastic modulus is around 0.7-0.8 GPa, and yield stress is around 16-19 MPa