Integrated computational materials engineering from a gas turbine engine perspective

Abstract

In 2008, the National Research Council published a landmark report on Integrated Computational Materials Engineering (ICME) and defined it as ‘an emerging discipline that aims to integrate computational materials science tools into a holistic system that can accelerate materials development, transform the engineering design optimization process, & unify design and manufacturing’. ICME is becoming a critical enabler for reducing the design/make cycle time and getting complex systems into production more quickly. There are several reasons why this is the case. Firstly, ICME allows materials experts to develop new material systems and methods of manufacture much more quickly. Advanced new materials and their associated manufacturing processes can be tailored to deliver products that meet design requirements quickly and more effectively in terms of cost and performance. Secondly, ICME enables design processes to quantify cause and affect relationships between manufacturing methods and variability, material properties, product geometry, and design requirement margins. In the design phase, material selection itself can impose consideration of material-specific failure modes that are naturally correlated to important attributes such as strength, weight, and geometry. ICME enables designers to quickly understand the complex and probabilistic interactions between the material, manufacturing processes, manufacturing variability, and design. Thirdly, it has been shown that successful account of variability of the manufacturing processes in life calculations leads to improved accuracy in declared low cycle fatigue crack initiation and damage tolerance lives on life limited gas turbine engine components. Furthermore, ICME enables engineers to rapidly explore more effective design and manufacturing solutions for delivering superior products at lower cost, faster but not without challenges. To highlight challenges and progress toward realization of this transformational technology, a survey of recent examples of materials and manufacturing process simulations along with the overarching approach and requirements within ICME to link these simulation capabilities to design and manufacturing methods will be reviewed from a gas turbine engine perspective.