RU174680U1 - Device for manufacturing parts by layer-by-layer laser synthesis - Google Patents

Abstract

The utility model relates to the field of powder metallurgy, and in particular to devices for the manufacture of complex labor-intensive parts from fine powder by laser layer-by-layer sintering, and can be used in various branches of mechanical engineering. A device for manufacturing parts from a powder material by laser-assisted laser synthesis, comprising a base with a removable substrate with a mechanism for its vertical movement and a protective cap with a protective gas supply valve to the working area, a powder material supply pipeline and a laser head, equipped with a mechanism for moving the laser head in a horizontal plane relative to substrate, which is mounted on the inner surface of the cap, while the laser head is equipped with a rotary sleeve coaxial with the drive the latter is turned off, and the material supply pipeline is flexible and rigidly fixed to the said rotary sleeve, and the protective cap is made in the form of a closed profile, repeating the profile of the substrate in horizontal section, and equipped with a mechanism for its vertical movement relative to the base with the possibility of complete overlapping of the working area in the lower position and unimpeded removal of the substrate from the mechanism of its vertical movement in the upper position. The technical result of the claimed utility model is to reduce the amount of consumed protective gas and material in the manufacture of the product by layered laser synthesis without loss of process quality. 2 ill.

Description

The utility model relates to the field of powder metallurgy, and in particular to devices for the manufacture of complex labor-intensive parts from fine powder by laser layer-by-layer sintering, and can be used in various branches of mechanical engineering.

Various devices and systems using laser technology are known, sintering (fusing) parts from powders. Selective laser melting (sintering) and laser cladding systems, consisting mainly of a laser-optical system, a working chamber with a vertically movable table, powder feeding mechanisms, with systems for evacuating, cleaning and protecting the gas environment, a control system, etc. (Installations of the Phenix 250 (France), EOSINTS 750 (Germany), TruCell 3008 (Germany), DM3D 505D (USA), Concept M2 (Germany, US Pat. No. 6215093 B1, publ. 10.04.2001) models.

A characteristic feature of the installations of these models is the high cost of powder material due to the peculiarity of the delivery of the material to the working area and the protective gas and / or carrier gas in the case of laser surfacing, which ultimately dramatically increases the cost of the manufactured product.

The closest to the proposed technical solution in terms of technical nature and the technical result achieved - the prototype - is a system containing a pulsed or continuous laser, a stationary device for supplying powder to the area of laser exposure using inert gas and a coordinate table moving in 3 planes (US 20040133298 A1, published on July 8, 2004).

To a greater or lesser extent, the prototype is characterized by the main disadvantages of the similar above systems, namely:

- high consumption of carrier / shielding gas;

- relatively low CMM (coefficient of consumable material) - from 10% to 80% depending on the size of the laser spot;

- the impossibility of forming the product by moving the laser as the powder supply system is stationary and the product is formed due to the movement of the coordinate table.

The latter factor leads to an increase in installation in dimensions, which may also be a disadvantage with small production areas.

The objective of this utility model is to modernize an existing device for manufacturing parts from powder material by layer-by-layer laser synthesis, aimed at reducing the amount of shielding gas and material consumed without loss of process quality.

The technical result of the claimed utility model is to reduce the consumption of protective / carrier gas and material.

The problem is solved, and the claimed technical result is achieved by the fact that the device for the manufacture of parts from powder material by layer-by-layer laser synthesis, containing a base with a removable substrate with a mechanism for its vertical movement and a protective cap with a valve for supplying a protective gas to the working area, a pipeline for supplying powder material and the laser head is equipped with a mechanism for moving the laser head in a horizontal plane relative to the substrate, which is fixed on the inner surface to lpaka, while the laser head is equipped with a coaxial rotary sleeve with a drive of controlled rotation of the latter, and the material supply pipe is flexible and rigidly fixed to the said rotary sleeve, and the protective cap is made in the form of a closed profile, repeating the profile of the substrate in horizontal section, and equipped with a mechanism its vertical movement relative to the base with the possibility of complete overlapping of the working area in the lower position and unimpeded removal of the substrate from its vertical mechanism eremescheniya in the top position.

The utility model is illustrated by graphic materials, where are schematically depicted in:

FIG. 1 - a device for producing products from powder materials (axial section);

FIG. 2 is a section AA in FIG. one;

The images shown contain the following items:

- protective cap 1;

- bed (in the general case, the base) 2;

- laser unit 3;

- material feed hopper 4;

- substrate 5;

- the main piston 6;

- auxiliary pistons 7;

- electric piston 8;

- laser head 9;

- linear guide x 10;

- linear guide at 11;

- carriage 12;

- electric motor guide x 13;

- pressure sensor 14;

- the reciprocal of the linear guide at 15;

- electric motor guide at 16;

- rotary sleeve 17;

- dispenser 18;

- material supply pipe 19;

- nozzle 20;

- optical fiber 21;

- gas supply / pumping valve 22;

- control unit 23;

- a gas cylinder 24;

- shielding gas supply wire 25;

- a mechanism for vertical movement of the frame 26;

- guide mechanism for vertical movement 27;

- electric motor of the vertical movement mechanism 28.

For a better understanding, the following is a comprehensive description of a device for manufacturing parts from a powder material by layer-by-layer laser synthesis.

The protective cap 1 is made in the form of a welded or prefabricated rigid box-shaped structure from square metal pipes. The cap is one of the basic units for fixing the main parts, components and equipment of the installation.

The bed (base) 2 is the second of the basic units of the device, the substrate 5 is mounted on the bed with the possibility of alternating up and down thanks to the main piston 6, auxiliary 7 (necessary to ensure plane parallelism of the substrate 4) and the piston electric drive 8. Cap 1 is put on the substrate 5 s using a sliding landing, covering it, and attached to the frame 2.

According to the claimed utility model, the cap 1 has a laser head 9 that moves along a linear guide x 10 and a linear guide at 11. The linear guides are fixed to the side walls of the cap 1. The linear guide x 10 contains a carriage 12 on which the laser head 9 is fixed, the carriage moves together with a laser head is carried out by a belt-and-pinion transmission and an electric motor of guide x 13. A linear guide x 10 with a laser head moves along the linear guide at 11 and its counterpart 15 due to ne transmission screw-nut and motor guide rail at 16.

The laser head 9 is equipped with a rotary sleeve 17 coaxial with it, which rotates 180 ° around on both sides of the laser head due to its controlled rotation drive (not shown in the figures). To the sleeve 17 is attached a dispenser 18, which is an electrovalve. An elastic screw-shaped material supply pipe 19 is introduced at one end of the electrovalve, a plastic round rigid pipe is attached to the other end, the latter acts as a nozzle 20 and can be replaced by a pipe of a different section in size and shape.

The feed hopper 4 is installed on the upper outer wall of the hood 1, designed to feed the material into the working area on the substrate 5, and can be replaced by a hopper for using other materials.

The gas supply / pumping valve 22 is designed to fill the volume inside the frame with shielding gas through the shielding gas supply wire 25 from the cylinder 24. Or the valve may be designed to create a vacuum by pumping out using a pump (not shown in the figure). The pressure sensor 14 is designed to control pressure in the working area.

The laser unit 3 is mounted on the inner wall of the cap 1 and is necessary for generating, focusing and transmitting laser radiation to the working area through the optical fiber 21 in the case of a solid-state laser or through mirrors (not shown in the figures) in the case of a gas laser source.

For the smooth removal of the substrate 5 from the pistons 6 and 7, the cap 1 is equipped with a vertical movement mechanism 26 and a guide 27. The mechanism can be made in the form of a pinion gear and moves in a vertical plane using an electric motor of the vertical movement mechanism 28.

The control unit 23 contains software designed to control the entire laser processing process. The unit controls the drives 8, 13, 16, 28, providing movement of the actuating units. The control unit is aligned with the laser unit and allows you to control the generation of laser radiation of a certain power at a certain point in time. In the control unit software, the required supply of protective gas and material is set.

A device for the manufacture of parts from a powder material layer-by-layer laser synthesis works as follows.

In the automatic design system (CAD) create a three-dimensional computer 3D-model of the product and break it into cross-sections, which serve as the basis for the layered manufacturing of the product.

The main piston 6 and the auxiliary pistons 7 are installed in the highest position, respectively, the substrate 5 is installed at the same level with the plane of the open end of the nozzle 20.

The pistons are lowered together with the substrate 5 by the size of the required layer of material (powder or equivalent - paste-like, in the form of a suspension, etc.), which will be subjected to laser processing.

The cap 1 through the gas supply / pumping valve 22 is filled with protective gas.

From the material supply hopper 4, through the material supply pipe 19, the dispenser 18 and the nozzle 20, material is fed into the working area on the substrate 5. Simultaneously with the material supply, the laser head 9 forms a layer of material by moving parallel lines along linear guides 10 and 11, with the sleeve 17 turns the open end of the nozzle 20 in the direction of movement of the laser head 9, which eliminates the overlap of the laser path / beam supplied to the working area of the material (powder, paste, suspension, etc.). Next, the laser beam generated by the laser unit 3, according to the program selectively remelts the applied layer of material by moving the laser head 9.

After laser exposure, the main piston 6 and auxiliary 7 are lowered down together with the substrate 5 by the amount necessary for the second layer of material.

Then a new layer of powder is applied over the previous one and processed by a laser beam, the operation is repeated until the product is completely manufactured. Moreover, the entire sequence of technological processes is carried out automatically in technologically regulated conditions using special software and hardware.

Obviously, the execution of the cap in the form of a closed profile, repeating in horizontal section the profile of the substrate and fixing the mechanism of relative movement in the horizontal plane of the substrate and the laser head on the inner surface of the cap with the possibility of moving the laser head relative to the substrate, significantly minimizes the consumption of protective / carrier gas by minimizing in comparison with the prototype of the working area, and the supply of the laser head coaxial to it with a rotary sleeve with a drive controlled rotation after more common, and the execution of the flexible material supply pipeline and its rigid fixation on the mentioned sleeve allows to ensure at least not the worst synthesis quality.

Thus, the claimed combination of features set forth in the formula of the utility model allows to significantly reduce the consumption of protective gas and material without loss of process quality.

The analysis of the claimed technical solution for compliance with the conditions of patentability showed that the characteristics indicated in the utility model are significant and interconnected with the formation of a stable aggregate of the necessary attributes unknown at the priority date from the prior art sufficient to obtain the claimed technical result.

Thus, the above information indicates the fulfillment of the following set of conditions when using the claimed technical solution:

- the object embodying the claimed technical solution, when implemented, relates to the field of powder metallurgy, and in particular to devices for the manufacture of complex labor-intensive parts from fine powder by laser layer-by-layer synthesis, and can be used in various branches of machine and aircraft building;

- for the claimed object in the form described in the utility model, the possibility of its implementation using the methods and methods described above and known from the prior art on the priority date has been confirmed;

- the object embodying the claimed technical solution, when implemented, is able to ensure the achievement of the technical result perceived by the applicant.

Therefore, the claimed subject matter meets the conditions of patentability “novelty” and “industrial applicability” under applicable law.

Claims (1)

A device for manufacturing parts from a powder material by laser-assisted laser synthesis, comprising a base with a removable substrate with a mechanism for its vertical movement and a protective cap with a protective gas supply valve to the working area, a powder material supply pipeline and a laser head, characterized in that it is equipped with a laser moving mechanism heads in a horizontal plane relative to the substrate, which is fixed on the inner surface of the cap, while the laser head is equipped with a coaxial rotation the second sleeve with a drive of controlled rotation of the latter, and the material supply pipe is flexible and rigidly fixed to the said rotary sleeve, and the protective cap is made in the form of a closed profile, repeating in horizontal section the profile of the substrate, and equipped with a mechanism for its vertical movement relative to the base with the possibility of complete overlap the working area in the lower position and unimpeded removal of the substrate from the mechanism of its vertical movement in the upper position.

Images