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Article
Publication date: 13 June 2023

Antonio Bacciaglia and Alessandro Ceruti

Timing constraints affect the manufacturing of traditional large-scale components through the material extrusion technique. Thus, researchers are exploring using many independent…

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Abstract

Purpose

Timing constraints affect the manufacturing of traditional large-scale components through the material extrusion technique. Thus, researchers are exploring using many independent and collaborative heads that may work on the same part simultaneously while still producing an appealing final product. The purpose of this paper is to propose a simple and repeatable approach for toolpath planning for gantry-based n independent extrusion heads with effective collision avoidance management.

Design/methodology/approach

This research presents an original toolpath planner based on existing slicing software and the traditional structure of G-code files. While the computationally demanding component subdivision task is assigned to computer-aided design and slicing software to build a standard G-code, the proposed algorithm scans the conventional toolpath data file, quickly isolates the instructions of a single extruder and inserts brief pauses between the instructions if the non-priority extruder conflicts with the priority one.

Findings

The methodology is validated on two real-life industrial large-scale components using architectures with two and four extruders. The case studies demonstrate the method's effectiveness, reducing printing time considerably without affecting the part quality. A static priority strategy is implemented, where one extruder gets priority over the other using a cascade process. The results of this paper demonstrate that different priority strategies reflect on the printing efficiency by a factor equal to the number of extrusion heads.

Originality/value

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first study to produce an original methodology to efficiently plan the extrusion heads' trajectories for a collaborative material extrusion architecture.

Details

Rapid Prototyping Journal, vol. 29 no. 9
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1355-2546

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Article
Publication date: 8 January 2020

Antonio Bacciaglia, Alessandro Ceruti and Alfredo Liverani

The purpose of this study is the evaluation of advantages and criticalities related to the application of addtive manufacturing (AM) to the production of parts for musical…

242

Abstract

Purpose

The purpose of this study is the evaluation of advantages and criticalities related to the application of addtive manufacturing (AM) to the production of parts for musical instruments. A comparison between traditional manufacturing and AM based on different aspects is carried out.

Design/methodology/approach

A set of mouthpieces produced through different AM techniques has been designed, manufactured and evaluated using an end-user satisfaction-oriented approach. A musician has been tasked to play the same classical music piece with different mouthpieces, and the sound has been recorded in a recording studio. The mouthpiece and sound characteristics have been evaluated in a structured methodology.

Findings

The quality of the sound and comfort of 3D printed mouthpieces can be similar to the traditional ones provided that an accurate design and proper materials and technologies are adopted. When personalization and economic issues are considered, AM is superior to mouthpieces produced by traditional techniques.

Research limitations/implications

In this research, a mouthpiece for trombone has been investigated. However, a wider analysis where several musical instruments and related parts are evaluated could provide more data.

Practical implications

The production of mouthpieces with AM techniques is suggested owing to the advantages which can be tackled in terms of customization, manufacturing cost and time reduction.

Originality/value

This research is carried out using a multidisciplinary approach where several data have been considered to evaluate the end user satisfaction of 3D printed mouthpieces.

Details

Rapid Prototyping Journal, vol. 26 no. 3
Type: Research Article
ISSN: 1355-2546

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