Superelastic NiTi Functional Components by High-Precision Laser Powder Bed Fusion Process: The Critical Roles of Energy Density and Minimal Feature Size

Additive manufacturing (AM) was recently developed for building intricate devices in many fields. Especially for laser powder bed fusion (LPBF), its high-precision manufacturing capability and adjustable process parameters are involved in tailoring the performance of functional components. NiTi is well-known as smart material utilized widely in biomedical fields thanks to its unique superelastic and shape-memory performance. However, the properties of NiTi are extremely sensitive to material microstructure, which is mainly determined by process parameters in LPBF. In this work, we choose a unique NiTi intricate component: a robotic cannula tip, in which material superelasticity is a crucial requirement as the optimal object. First, the process window was confirmed by printing thin walls and bulk structures. Then, for optimizing parameters precisely, a Gyroid-type sheet triply periodic minimal-surface (G-TPMS) structure was proposed as the standard test sample. Finally, we verified that when the wall thickness of the G-TPMS structure is smaller than 130 μm, the optimal energy density changes from 167 J/m³ to 140 J/m³ owing to the lower cooling rate of thinner walls. To sum up, this work puts forward a novel process optimization methodology and provides the processing guidelines for intricate NiTi components by LPBF.