RObust and Sustainable Additive Manufacturing of Amorphous Metallic Alloys

Bulk metallic glasses (BMGs) are promising materials to support the goal to make EU climate-neutral by 2050, and promote the growth of many industrial sectors such as biomedical.

Thanks to their amorphous nature, BMGs offer an outstanding combination of high strength, corrosion/wear resistance and biocompability.

Recently, Additive Manufacturing (AM) has been proposed as a solution to tackle the size limitation of the conventional casting production of BMGs.

Still, many challenges remain to develop defect-free parts with mechanical performances comparable to their as-cast counterparts.

In addition, to date, no post-processes can be applied to close porosity and improve quality without altering the amorphous state of the material.

The project ROSAMA2 hosted by SIMaP in Grenoble aims to develop a RObust and Sustainable Additive Manufacturing of Amorphous Metallic Alloys by laser powder bed fusion.

In situ X-ray microtomography will enable the 3D reconstruction of the deposited material layer-by-layer using a unique miniature system designed for usage at synchrotrons.

The high brilliance of the radiation will reveal the quality of the powder bed, the morphology of the deposited material, the presence of defects in its volume and their evolution upon processing. Doing so, strategies to eliminate porosity in situ will be proposed.

The printed BMGs will be evaluated to determine the role of defects, structural and chemical heterogeneities on the mechanical performances, by means of X-ray nanotomography, advanced thermal analyses, high resolution microscopy, nano-indentation and compression testing.

In a final effort, strategies to enhance powder recyclability and limit pick-up of oxygen, harmful to the glass forming ability, will be developed, and the role of process atmosphere composition will be considered. Besides strengthening EUs position on the AM market, ROSAMA2 will develop and consolidate Dr.

Pauzons profile and secure future position in academia and industry.