Effective Elastic Properties of Additively Manufactured Metallic Lattice Structures: Unit-Cell Modeling

Lattice structures are lightweight materials, which exhibit a unique combination of properties such as air and water permeability, energy and acoustic absorption, low thermal conductivity, and electrical insulation. In this work, unit-cell homogenization was used to predict the effective elastic moduli of octet-truss (OT) lattice structures manufactured using selective laser melting (SLM). OT structures were manufactured using a Renishaw AM 250 SLM machine with various relative densities. Compression test was carried out at strain rate 5 × 10-3 m-1 using an MTS frame. Finite element analysis was used in the determination of the OT’s effective elastic properties. Results from the finite element analysis were validated using experiments. It was observed that the finite element predictions were in good agreement with the experimental results.