Nickel-based alloys have fabrication issues such as requiring more fabrication time than general-purpose metal materials due to their hardness. However, because it is a high-strength material, it is an appropriate material when designing thinner components. This conflicting relationship between manufacturing and design makes it difficult to apply nickel-based alloys as a general-purpose material for industrial components. One way to solve this issue is to creat multi-materials by wire arc additive manufacturing (WAAM). Since the strength required for a component is not necessarily uniform throughout the component, an appropriate balance between manufacturing and design can be achieved if nickel-base alloys can be applied only to areas subjected to high stress. Several studies have conducted fundamental evaluations of the mechanical properties and other aspects of multi-materialization of nickel-base alloys and general-purpose stainless steels by WAAM. However, the study of manufacturing multi-materialized industrial components by the combination of these materials has not progressed. In this study, an experimental investigation was conducted to fabricate an axial-flow impeller with multi-material blades by WAAM and machining. The materials used were Inconel 718 and SST 316L. A 3D scan of the fabricated axial-flow impeller confirmed that it was finished according to the design dimensions. Furthermore, observation of the multi-materialized blades by X-ray CT revealed the presence of several small internal defects. Although the reduction in these internal defects is an issue for the future works, the possibility of applying multilateralization by WAAM to the manufacturing of industrial components was experimentally demonstrated.
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A Study on Manufacturing of an Axial-Flow Impeller with Multi-Material Blades of Inconel 718 and SST 316L by Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing
Published:
03 December 2025
by MDPI
in The 6th International Electronic Conference on Applied Sciences
session Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Abstract:
Keywords: additive manufacturing; WAAM; multi-material; Impeller; blade
