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US 12,280,420 B2Granted
Method of making an inorganic reticulated foam structure
AssigneeERG Aerospace Corporation
InventorsMitchell Hall, Mark Benson, Metodi Zlantinov, Alex Parke, Denver Schaffarzick
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Abstract
A new method of manufacturing a dual investment reticulated solid mold for producing reticulated metal foam, that includes 3D printing of a wax or resin reticulated precursor prior to pre-investment with a pre-investment plaster or pre-investment ceramic plaster, and removal of the precursor before addition of liquid metal to generate reticulated metal foam.
Claims34
A method of manufacturing a reticulated plaster mold or a reticulated ceramic plaster mold comprising
- (a) selecting dimensions for preparation of a reticulated precursor, wherein the dimensions are selected from a library produced by the method comprising
- (i) obtaining at least one piece of existing reticulated foam metal;
- (ii) obtaining at least one piece of solid metal of the same composition as the reticulated foam metal of step (i);
- (iii) attaching the at least one piece of reticulated foam metal of step (i) to the at least one piece of solid metal of step (ii) to form a sample;
- (iv) performing a CT scan of the sample to generate a CT scan output;
- (v) reassembling the output of step (iv) into at least one 2D image file;
- (vi) generating an isosurface value;
- (vii) using the isosurface value to convert the at least one image file into a 3D surface file;
- (viii) optionally modifying the 3D surface file to alter the pore size and/or ligament density;
- and
- (ix) generating at least one generic 3D surface dataset that provides the dimensions for the precursor;
- (b) optionally altering ligament thickness;
- (c) optionally altering porosity;
- (d) 3D printing the reticulated precursor based upon the dimensions of at least one of steps (a)-(c);
- (e) pre-investing the precursor with a pre-investment plaster or pre-investment ceramic plaster to encapsulate the precursor;
- and
- (f) removing the precursor to produce a reticulated plaster or a reticulated ceramic plaster mold.
14 more elements
A method of manufacturing a dual investment mold comprising
- (a) selecting dimensions for preparation of a reticulated precursor, wherein the dimensions are selected from a library produced by the method comprising
- (i) obtaining at least one piece of existing reticulated foam metal;
- (ii) obtaining at least one piece of solid metal of the same composition as the reticulated foam metal of step (i);
- (iii) attaching the at least one piece of reticulated foam metal of step (i) to the at least one piece of solid metal of step (ii) to form a sample;
- (iv) performing a CT scan of the sample to generate a CT scan output;
- (v) reassembling the output of step (iv) into at least one 2D image file;
- (vi) generating an isosurface value;
- (vii) using the isosurface value to convert the at least one image file into a 3D surface file;
- (viii) optionally modifying the 3D surface file to alter the pore size and/or ligament density;
- and
- (ix) generating at least one generic 3D surface dataset that provides the dimensions for the precursor;
- (b) optionally altering ligament thickness;
- (c) optionally altering porosity;
- (d) 3D printing the reticulated precursor based upon the dimensions of at least one of steps (a)-(c);
- (e) pre-investing the precursor with a pre-investment plaster or pre-investment ceramic plaster to encapsulate the precursor;
- (f) investing the encapsulated precursor of step (e) with a second plaster or ceramic plaster;
- and
- (g) removing the precursor to obtain a dual investment reticulated plaster solid mold or a dual investment reticulated ceramic plaster solid mold.
15 more elements
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.