DEVELOPMENT OF INNOVATIVE HYBRID ALUMINUM COMPONENT THAT INTEGRATE ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY (SLM) AND DIE CASTING PROCESS

Additive Manufacturing (AM) of metal parts attracts a significant interest in recent years due to new technology developments that enable the production of a fully dense metal part with complex geometry directly from 3D CAD model. One of the most attractive application relates to the possibility to produce a hybrid part that integrates AM technology with conventional casting process in order to reduce production cost. In particular, the combination of AM and high pressure die casting (HPDC) process can create a synergistic effect in terms of integrated properties and cost affordability. The present study aims at evaluating the possibility of generating hybrid HPDC/AM aluminum component (A380/AlSi10Mg) with embedded heat exchanger produced by AM technology using Selective Laser Melting (SLM) technique. In practice, the printed heat exchanger insert was mounted within a protective box with 3 different wall thicknesses: 2, 3 and 5 mm, in order to prevent its melting during the HPDC process. The results obtained have shown that the optimum hybrid component that was nearly free from structural defects was obtained using the printed box with 5 mm wall thickness.