Intelligent toolpath for extrusion-based LM process

To fabricate high quality parts, and to make the development generic yet compatible with the in-house hardware, a virtual simulation system has been developed, and an in-house intelligent multi-material toolpath generation system has been under development. This new development includes the issues such as multiple fill-toolpaths for the same material, interface mismatch between adjacent materials and the intelligent toolpath features for machine control. After the multi-material toolpath file generated by the in-house software, the existing virtual graphical simulation as well as well selected part fabrication experiments were used to validate it. Based on the authors' ongoing research about multi-material layered manufacturing, it was determined that the build characteristic was heavily dependent on the material being used. Therefore, it was important to develop the hardware/software that will accommodate this requirement.