ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING: A NEW CONCEPT FOR END USERS. THE CASE OF MAGNETIC MATERIALS

Metal additive manufacturing (AM) technology is growing up as a technology. Although up today slower and less reliable than traditional production methods, AM systems are showing to be very successful when producing parts with unconventional topologies or in small quantities. In addition, it is showing its capability to produce components with chemical compositions which should not be realized with standard production processes. In this paper some examples are reported of magnetic materials specifically designed for AM. In this work, powder of FeSi electric steel, with 6.5 wt.% Si content is considered to produce samples by AM. Aim of this paper is to investigate the microstructural and texture evolution of FeSi steels, with 6.5% Si, following annealing heat treatment, with the aim of identifying the conditions under which it could be possible to obtain the best magnetization behavior of the alloys.