A new reliability approach for additive layers manufactured components: A preliminary investigation

This paper deals with the idea of developing new philosophies for the reliability assessment of additive layer manufacturing (ALM) parts. ALM is a disruptive new manufacturing method by which components are created adding material layer after layer, allowing for the design and production of complex geometries, unthinkable with the use of traditional subtractive machining methods. Thinking ALM means to introduce new methodologies and software and new qualification of the whole process from raw materials to the finite part, passing through the mechanical design, the manufacturing, the post-processing, to cite a few. Concepts of reliability and degradation, together with the related models, need to be modified accordingly, whereas the choice of parameters and figures of merit to be taken into account in the numerical methods has to be carefully selected.