Design, Configuration Synthesis, and Experimental Study of Side-Rolling Metamorphic Mechanism for Metal Additive Manufacturing

Arc additive manufacturing (AAM) has the advantages of fast deposition speed and good surfacing quality. It is a promising additive manufacturing (AM) method. However, arc additive manufacturing is difficult to use widely in industry due to its poor deformation, microstructure, and mechanical properties. Since the mechanical properties of materials can be greatly improved by rolling, a method for configuration synthesis of the side-rolling mechanism by using metamorphic mechanism theory is presented in this paper. Firstly, by analyzing the operational demands of the side-rolling mechanism, we obtained the motion cycle diagram for the metamorphic mechanism in addition to the corresponding equivalent resistance gradient matrix. Secondly, according to the motion cycle diagram and equivalent resistance gradient matrix of the metamorphic mechanism, the structure and constraint form of the metamorphic joints were established, and the relationship between the force variation and the structure and the constraint form of the metamorphic joints was also obtained. Then, the structures of all 12 corresponding constrained metamorphic mechanisms were synthesized. Ultimately, one among the twelve mechanisms was chosen as the side-rolling metamorphic mechanism. The topological transformation of its working configuration was examined. The results confirmed the feasibility and practicality of the proposed structural synthesis method in this study.