Experimental investigation on mechanical properties of 3D printed specimens with varying infill patterns

Abstract

Additive manufacturing (AM) is a rapidly expanding advanced manufacturing technology that enables high accuracy and low-cost manufacturing of physical models and complex geometric structures. AM technology is currently found in a wide range of engineering applications, such as the mechanical, biomedical, construction, aerospace, and food industries. But there are many parameters on which the mechanical properties of 3D-printed components depend. In the present work, the influence of infill patterns of 3D-printed polylactic acid (PLA) components on mechanical properties is investigated. 3D printed components with a build plate temperature of 200 degrees, a printing temperature of 50 degrees, an infill density of 30 %, an infill thickness of 4 mm, and varying infill patterns are printed. Different infill patterns used are line, triangle, hexagon, and 3D infill. All samples are printed as per ASTM standards and are tested for their mechanical properties like tensile strength, hardness, and impact strength. Tensile strength is found to be highest for the hexagonal infill pattern and least for the line infill pattern. Toughness and hardness are found to be highest for the 3D infill pattern, with 222 % and 61.82 % enhancement over the line infill pattern. Under cyclic loading, the hexagonal infill specimen failed at 25614 cycles at loading conditions of 0.3‐–0.7 kN and at a frequency of 10 Hz.