Robotic additive manufacturing process simulation - towards design and analysis with building parameter in consideration

Additive manufacturing (AM) provides an opportunity to a new design concept in which the manufacturing constrain is released. The engineering design and optimization can include part building parameters to take the advantages of additive manufacturing or 3D printing technology. This paper presents a robotic additive manufacturing process simulation method which pushes one step further in the direction of design and analysis of AM part with building parameters in consideration. A virtual part with design geometry and building bead from Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) technology is presented in a robotic simulation software platform - RobotStudio. The part building path and bead size can be tuned based on the AM path, FDM equipment, robot model, extrusion head types, and configuration as well as building temperature and material properties. Future work in this direction is also proposed and discussed.