Special-Purpose Techniques for Additive Manufacturing

Special-purpose techniques for common additive manufacturing processes are described in this section.

The functionality in Abaqus/Standard for additive manufacturing processes simulation is developed on a user subroutine infrastructure and keyword interface that provides a high degree of control and customization. Abaqus/Standard provides very general capabilities for the simulation of additive manufacturing processes using either thermomechanical or eigenstrain analyses (see Thermomechanical Simulation of Additive Manufacturing Processes and Eigenstrain-Based Simulation of Additive Manufacturing Processes).

In addition, a number of special-purpose techniques are available for simulation of common AM processes that do not require you to write user subroutines. These techniques are implemented as "internal" user subroutines in Abaqus using the same user subroutine infrastructure and keyword interface. These special-purpose techniques are accessed by using table collections with string names starting with either "ABQ_AM" or "ABQ_EIG". Table collections with string names starting with "ABQ_AM" and "ABQ_EIG" are reserved for special-purpose techniques and should not be used when programming your own user subroutines.

You can use these special-purpose techniques to define:

  • Progressive element activation in a structural or a thermal analysis to simulate controlled deposition of raw materials. You can simulate a layer-upon-layer raw material deposition by a recoater or roller blade used in powder bed–type processes and a bead type deposition sequence for materials injected through nozzles used in directed energy deposition processes.
  • Moving heat fluxes to model laser-induced heating in a thermal analysis.

To activate these special-purpose techniques, you must define the pertinent manufacturing process parameters in table collections that follow prescribed conventions. The sections that follow describe these conventions. The table collections must adhere to the naming conventions and include parameter and property tables of predetermined types. You can refer to these table collections from progressive element activation and/or distributed heat flux definitions. Abaqus activates elements and applies heat fluxes automatically using the specified process parameters.


In this section: