Microstructural and Mechanical Characterization of Ti6Al4V Cellular Struts Fabricated by Electron Beam Powder Bed Fusion Additive Manufacturing

Despite the widespread use of the electron beam powder bed fusion (EB-PBF) additive manufacturing (AM) process in the fabrication of cellular structures, relatively little is known about the microstructural and mechanical properties of the individual cellular struts of different geometries fabricated by the EB-PBF. In this study, experimental investigation was carried out in the attempt to establish preliminary understanding of the material characteristics of the Ti6Al4V cellular struts using EB-PBF under various geometry design conditions (dimension and orientation angle). It was found that there exist significant geometry effects for the material characteristics of the Ti6Al4V cellular struts, which indicates that a non-uniform material model should be considered in the future design of these cellular structures.