Tensile Characteristics of Low Density Infill Patterns for Mass Reduction of 3D Printed Polylactic Parts

Abstract

Various infill patterns are introduced in 3D printing to generate low density objects that leads to reduced cost and fabrication time through mass reduction. However, as a trade-off, the strength of the 3D printed component is uncertain. Confusions arise in determining the infill pattern with highest value of tensile strength since most studies limited only to rectilinear, honeycomb, and concentric infill patterns. As consequences, there are very little information on rarely used infill patterns such as Hilbert curve, Archimedean cord and octagram spiral. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to investigate and compare the tensile strength and strain of all infill patterns in mass reduction of 3D printed components experimentally. Following ASTM D638 type III standard, ten tensile test specimens of each infill patterns with 20% density were printed with an FFF 3D printer and were then tested. It was found that Archimedean cords infill pattern had the highest specific tensile strength of 33.23×103 MPa∙mm3/g which made it as the optimum infill pattern for the mass reduction of 3D printed parts with a high tensile strength. On the other hand, having the highest specific tensile strain of 18.21×103 %∙mm3/g, concentric infill pattern was found to be more suitable for producing lightweight parts with a higher elongation before break. Additionally, Hilbert curve infill was the worst selection for mass reduction since it had the lowest values of specific tensile strength and specific strain of 19.80×103 MPa∙mm3/g and 8.34 %∙mm3/g, respectively. Nevertheless, the trends of tensile strength and strain of all six infill patterns had been obtained, especially for rarely investigated infill patterns of Archimedean cords, octagram spiral, and Hilbert curve. Specifically, the trend from the strongest to the weakest (in % compared to solid) for specific tensile strength is rectilinear (38.57%), Archimedean chords (37.29%), concentric (36.57%), octagram spiral (34.79%), honeycomb (27.84%), and Hilbert curve (22.25%), while for specific strain is concentric (102.6%), octagram spiral (83.94%), rectilinear (78.22%), Archimedean cords (77.99%), honeycomb (54.84%), and Hilbert curve (45.14%).