Curved Layer Fused Deposition Modeling with Varying Raster Orientations

Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) is one of the relatively more successful Additive Manufacturing (AM) techniques and is more widely applied in the recent past. Apart from finding alternative materials targeting specific industrial application, FDM is also researched for medical applications with biopolymers and composites. While commercial FDM uses flat layer slicing of CAD models as the basic approach for the process, alternative slicing and deposition schemes such as curved layer FDM evolved specifically for thin shell-like parts. Curved layer FDM was shown to be effective in imparting better surface quality as well as mechanical strength of parts produced. Past research also established that raster angle plays a significant role on the mechanical characteristics of FDM parts. The current research attempts to bring the two approaches together and establish the effects of varying raster angles on the performance of parts produced by curved layer FDM. Mathematical algorithms used for curved layer slicing are reviewed and experimental results based on curved layer samples printed with varying raster angels are discussed.