The hybrid manufacturing cell: Determining key parameters in the integration of powder bed fusion with high speed milling

Additive manufacturing (AM) technology is highly efficient for producing complex object geometries such as bespoke lattice structures or internal channelization in the product. However the principle of building objects by the successive addition of material makes the production of large and massive objects time consuming, and therefore also an expensive operation. For metallic materials, this limitation can be avoided by combining AM of the complex sections of the product with traditional high-speed machining of the more massive and geometrically simple sections into a hybrid manufacturing solution. However, hybrid manufacturing is a complex process, and there are several crucial points that have to be under control in order to receive the full benefits of an integrated functionality. This paper presents a method to determine the key variables and constants necessary for the integration of a powder bed fusion machine with a high-speed milling machine into a hybrid manufacturing cell.