3-D printed semi-crystalline and amorphous polymer articles
AssigneeArkema France
InventorsDavid Shin-Ren Liu, Mark A. Aubart, Sara Reynaud
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Abstract
The invention relates to 3D printed parts made with thermoplastic polymers having a low stiffening temperature. 3D printed parts of the invention have very good Z layer adhesion, have a high elongation at break in the Z direction, preferably of more than 50 percent, and have at least an 80 percent ratio of Z to XY stress at yield or at break. The resulting part may be nearly isotropic—having similar mechanical properties in the XY and Z print directions. The excellent layer adhesion makes the resultant printed part more robust—able to withstand many cycles of use. Certain polymers of the invention produce printed parts that have a very low haze, and are nearly transparent.
Claims17
A 3D-printed article formed from an extrusion 3-D printing process, the article comprising:
- one or more semicrystalline thermoplastic polymers, wherein said one or more semicrystalline thermoplastic polymers have a cross-over temperature (G′/G″) of 78-133° C. as measured by parallel plate rheology and the extrusion 3-D printed article has an elongation to break in the Z direction of greater than 50%;
- wherein G′ is the storage modulus of the one or more semicrystalline thermoplastic polymers, and
- wherein G″ is the loss modulus of the one or more semicrystalline thermoplastic polymers,
- wherein the extrusion 3-D printing process includes extrusion printing the one or more semicrystalline thermoplastic polymers at an effective temperature that is higher than the cross-over temperature of the one or more semicrystalline thermoplastic polymers,
- said semi-crystalline thermoplastic polymers being a polyamide block copolymer comprising polyamide blocks and polyether blocks.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.