Repeatability and Counterproliferation of Metal Additive Manufacturing Technologies in Aerospace Applications
Open Access
- Author:
- Maley, Siri Katrina
- Area of Honors:
- Aerospace Engineering
- Degree:
- Bachelor of Science
- Document Type:
- Thesis
- Thesis Supervisors:
- Dr. Sven G Bilén, Thesis Supervisor
Robert Graham Melton, Thesis Honors Advisor - Keywords:
- Additive Manufacturing
Solid Freeform Fabrication
Counterproliferation
Cybersecurity
Quality Assurance
Aerospace
Air Force - Abstract:
- Additive manufacturing (“3D printing”) is emerging as a promising and disruptive technology for high-performance military aerospace applications. The ability to additively print rather than subtractively machine critical components presents opportunities to lower cost, weight, production time, part count, and material waste while improving performance and functionality. However, reliance on additive manufacturing also involves storing increasingly large amounts of sensitive information and intellectual property in digital media. As the additive manufacturing industry continues to rapidly develop, the factors affecting its accessibility and repeatability from digital information are subject to constant change. This thesis examines the current and future accessibility of additive manufacturing and the cybersecurity risks of its associated digital information. It then synthesizes this to analyze potential interdiction points in the proliferation of high-performance additive manufacturing. This thesis concludes by experimentally testing the current repeatability of high-performance additive manufacturing under one counterproliferation leverage point: the use of recycled titanium 6-4 powder to simulate interdiction of a consumables supply chain. The study concludes that direct metal laser sintering of the tensile specimens resulted in critical surface inconsistencies, including biases based on part orientation and some out-of-tolerance geometry. However, the specimens exhibited no significant variation in performance-critical mechanical properties (modulus of elasticity and yield strength).