Influence of Bed Temperature on Heat Shrinkage Shape Error in FDM Additive Manufacturing of the ABS-Engineering Plastic

Abstract

In case of manufacturing hexahedral ABS (Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene) plastic components using a FDM (Fused Deposition Modeling)-based 3D printer, undesirable shape errors occur in the product due to heat shrinkage. This paper experimentally ob-served the influence of the bed temperature change on the deformed shape errors of a hexahedral specimen of 100 × 50 × 50 mm3 produced by using a 3D printer. During printing work, the head nozzle temperature was kept at 240?C and the head speed was set at 50 mm/s. The chamber was enclosed with a PC-plate. 3D printing was conducted at four different bed temperatures; 50?C, 70?C, 90?C, and 110?C. After the produced specimens naturally cooled down to room temperature, their deformed shape errors were measured. As a result, the higher the bed temperature, the lower the deformed shape errors of the specimens were. However, if the bed temperature had exceeded 120?C, laminating adhesion became poor. That seems to occur because of the material phase change and can make 3D printing work very hard as a consequence. Results of this study can be helpful to set optimum bed temperature condition in FDM additive manufacturing.