ABSTRACT
This chapter presents how additive manufacturing (AM) can support military applications to illustrate the principles for applying it to other industries. It focuses on material characterization to address differences from traditionally machined parts and second on advanced design methods such as topology optimization. Starting from 3D plastic printers, AM machines have come a long way to delivering production-quality metal parts. Researchers have used various treatments on AM-produced parts to alter the high-cycle fatigue properties. The AM-topology optimization solution combines thin walls for better fragmentation performance with internal stiffeners for better impact performance. Truss optimization, like topology optimization, optimizes where members are placed to connect together to form a structure. Large finite element models are computationally challenging in certain circumstances, even for linear analysis; therefore, there is some upper limit on computation for topology optimization. The basis of topology optimization rests on using finite element analysis to determine the structural response.
