Density characteristics of laser-sintered three-dimensional printing parts investigated by using an integrated finite element analysis-based evolutionary algorithm approach

An integrated finite element analysis-evolutionary algorithm simulation approach is proposed in this work to model the density characteristics of the three-dimensional printing, specifically for selective laser sintering process. The approach consists of modeling sintering phenomenon by finite element analysis simulation, which is further fed into an evolutionary algorithm cluster comprising genetic programming. The integrated approach is useful to model the functional relationship of density characteristic of selective laser sintering-fabricated components with respect to laser power, scan velocity and scan spacing. Performance of the proposed model is evaluated against the actual results obtained from the literature. We find that our proposed finite element analysis-evolutionary algorithm model is able to model the selective laser sintering process very well, which can be used to complement the analytically and experimentally obtained results. For the validation of the robustness of the model, we also conducted sensitivity and parametric analyses and investigated the specific influence, and variation, of each of the input process parameters on the density of the selective laser sintering-fabricated component. It was found that scan spacing has the least influence, whereas scan velocity has the highest influence on the density of the selective laser sintering-fabricated component. Non-linear relationships unveiled between the process parameters highlight the capability of the model in simulating the density characteristic of the complex selective laser sintering process in uncertain input conditions.