GKN Powder Metallurgy, Bonn, is validating the use of DP 600 dual-phase steel on the EOS M300-4 additive manufacturing platform as the Industrialization and Digitalization of Additive Manufacturing (IDAM) project reaches the halfway stage.
The IDAM project was set up in 2019, with twelve industrial and academic partners looking to address the limitations of powder bed fusion technologies and enhance its suitability for serial production application in markets such as automotive. Partly funded by The German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF), the $23 million initiative aims to build two pilot production lines powered by the Internet of Things and automation technologies, and designed for the additive manufacturing of automotive components.
GKN Powder Metallurgy is set to host one of these production lines at its Bonn facility, with BMW’s Munich center home to the other, and has recently begun working with DP 600 steel on its recently required EOS M300-4 metal 3D printer. The material is a dual-phase steel that can be tuned by suitable heat treatment methods. It features an elongation rate of 22% with heat treatment, and 13% without, while demonstrating a tensile strength of 700 MPa with heat treatment, and 950 MPa as-built.
GKN partners include Volkmann GmbH, Fraunhofer Institute for Laser Technology ILT, and Technical University of Munich. The group believes the material will be suitable for a number of structural applications in the automotive sector and elsewhere, with further potential for cost-per-part reductions using water-atomized powders. The company is also testing out multi-laser exposure strategies on the M300-4 to in a bid to expand its productivity.
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