Speaker
Description
Copper and its alloys play an elementary role in industrial applications due to their excellent thermal and electrical conductivity. In the field of electromobility, plugs made of copper materials are used as connecting elements between the charging station and the vehicle. Another example is the application of precipitation-strengthened copper alloys, e.g., CuCr1Zr and CuNi2SiCr, for manufacturing of welding electrodes and tools. With the help of LPBF, the excellent thermal, electrical and mechanical properties of copper alloys can be combined with the greatest possible geometric freedom, thus enabling new types of application with a high degree of functional integration, like water-cooled plug connections. However, the complete remelting of copper powders with a high copper content (> 95%) by LPBF is associated with considerable difficulties due to the large beam reflection and the high thermal conductivity. In order to increase the absorbance, the usage of a green laser system is therefore recommended for copper alloys.
Within the scope of this study, various copper materials, for example, Cu-OFE, CuCr1Zr and CuNi2SiCr, were considered. By means of gas atomization, metal powder was produced, metallographically prepared, microscopically analyzed with respect to pore formation and spherodicity and eventually processed by LPBF using both, a 532nm green and a 1060nm red laser system. Different process parameters, such as laser power, feed speed, hatching strategy and focus diameter were used. The manufactured components were then prepared metallographically and characterized by means of light optical microscopy (incl. microhardness testing) and analytical scanning electron microscopy in combination with EDX, EBSD and FIB to obtain the microstructure parameters, pore size and distribution, precipitates, layer structure and texture effects.
| Speaker Country | Germny |
|---|