Digital twins of plastic-based AM process for process monitoring and connection to production planning

• Main Author: Τζιμάνης, Κωνσταντίνος
• Other Authors: Tzimanis, Konstantinos
• Language: English
• Published: 2020
• Subjects: Additive manufacturing; FDM process; Digital twin; Platform; Production planning; Προσθετική τεχνολογία; FDM μέθοδος; Ψηφιακό δίδυμο; Πλατφόρμα; Προγραμματισμός παραγωγής

This Diploma Thesis aims to study in detail the Additive Manufacturing processes and especially the Fused Deposition modelling (FDM) process as well as the involved process parameters. The FDM process is one of the most known process as, it is an easy, reliable and affordable process which offers satisfied results and can be used from non-professionals. This work aims to integrate process, empirical and theoretical, models on a platform that act as Digital Twin in order to improve the process performance and the product quality as well as to proceed to production planning. Several theoretical models that describe the FDM process have been found. The selected models, that have been implemented on MATLAB, investigate the process cycle time, the energy consumption as well as the extrusion forces. The model outputs indicate how the various process parameters affect the process performance and efficiency. Although theoretical models can be useful for the production planning by predicting the process build time, experimental work is required for the investigation of product quality for different values of the examined process parameters. With the aid of an affordable monitoring system, the performance indicators such as surface roughness, energy consumption and product dimensional accuracy can be measured. The acquired knowledge is going to be integrated on a platform that undertakes the production planning.