Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF) is an additive manufacturing (AM) technology that has emerged as the predominant technology for metal 3D printing. An alloy of particular interest to the aerospace industry is the nickel-based superalloy, Inconel 718 (IN718), which is widely used for its superior performance in elevated temperature conditions, particularly for gas-turbine engine blades and heat exchangers. With LPBF providing new ways of exploiting complex part geometry, the high-temperature properties of the AM version of the alloy must be understood. Of additional interest is how these properties change as a function of geometry and post-processing. This research focuses on the behavior of LPBF IN718 as a function of hot isostatic pressing (HIP) and specimen thickness at elevated temperatures. These results and behavior were compared to the behavior of IN718 sheet metal for properties such as True Ultimate Tensile Strength (UTS), Yield Strength, Young’s Modulus, percent elongation, and necking. The results showed dependence of strength on both thickness and HIP condition, and also exhibited a steep drop in UTS and yield strength at 1600 °F, linearly declining modulus, and excess dynamic strain ageing (DSA) behavior at certain temperatures.

With the advancement of the Additive Manufacturing technology in the fields of metals, a lot of interest has developed in Laser Powder Bed (LPBF) for the Aerospace and Automotive industries. With primary challenges like high cost and time associated with this process reducing the build time is a critical component. Being a layer by layer process increasing layer thickness causes a decrease in manufacturing time. In this study, effects of the change in layer thickness in the Laser Powder Bed Fusion of Inconel 718 were evaluated. The effects were investigated for 30, 60 and 80 μm layer thicknesses and were evaluated for Relative Density, Surface Roughness and Mechanical properties, for as-printed specimens not subjected to any heat treatment. The process was optimized to print dense pasts by varying three parameters: power, velocity and hatch distance. Significant change in some properties like true Ultimate Tensile Testing (UTS), %Necking and Yield Stress was observed.

Solar energy has become one of the most popular renewable energy in human’s life because of its abundance and environment friendliness. To achieve high solar energy conversion efficiency, it usually requires surfaces to absorb selectivity within one spectral range of interest and reflect strongly over the rest of the spectrum. An economic method is always desired to fabricate spectrally selective surfaces with improved energy conversion efficiency. Colloidal lithography is a recently emerged way of nanofabrication, which has advantages of low-cost and easy operation.

In this thesis, aluminum metasurface structures are proposed based on colloidal lithography method. High Frequency Structure Simulator is used to numerically study optical properties and design the aluminum metasurfaces with selective absorption. Simulation results show that proposed aluminum metasurface structure on aluminum oxide thin film and aluminum substrate has a major reflectance dip, whose wavelength is tunable within the near-infrared and visible spectrum with metasurface size. As the metasurface is opaque due to aluminum film, it indicates strong wavelength-selective optical absorption, which is due to the magnetic resonance between the top metasurface and bottom Al film within the aluminum oxide layer.

The proposed sample is fabricated based on colloidal lithography method. Monolayer polystyrene particles of 500 nm are successfully prepared and transferred onto silicon substrate. Scanning electron microscope is used to check the surface topography. Aluminum thin film with 20-nm or 50-nm thickness is then deposited on the sample. After monolayer particles are removed, optical properties of samples are measured by micro-scale optical reflectance and transmittance microscope. Measured and simulated reflectance of these samples do not have frequency selective properties and is not sensitive to defects. The next step is to fabricate the Al metasurface on Al_2 O_3 and Al films to experimentally demonstrate the selective absorption predicted from the numerical simulation.

Additive manufacturing, also known as 3-dimensional (3-d) printing, is now a rapidly growing manufacturing technique. Innovative and complex designs in various aspects of engineering have called for more efficient manufacturing techniques and 3-d printing has been a perfect choice in that direction. This research investigates the use of additive manufacturing in fabricating polymer heat exchangers and estimate their effectiveness as a heat transfer device. Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM), Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) and Stereolithography (SLA) are the three 3-d printing techniques that are explored for their feasibility in manufacturing heat exchangers. The research also explores a triply periodic minimal structure–the gyroid, as a heat exchanger design. The performance of the gyroid heat exchanger was studied using experiments. The main parameters considered for the experiments were heat transfer rate, effectiveness and pressure drop. From the results obtained it can be inferred that using polymers in heat exchangers helps reducing corrosion and fouling problems, but it affects the effectiveness of the heat exchangers. For our design, the maximum effectiveness achieved was 0.1. The pressure drop for the heat exchanger was observed to decrease with an increase in flow rate and the maximum pressure drop measured was 0.88 psi for a flow rate of 5 LPM.

Additive manufacturing (AM) describes an array of methods used to create a 3D object layer by layer. The increasing popularity of AM in the past decade has been due to its demonstrated potential to increase design flexibility, produce rapid prototypes, and decrease material waste. Temporary supports are an inconvenient necessity in many metal AM parts. These sacrificial structures are used to fabricate large overhangs, anchor the part to the build substrate, and provide a heat pathway to avoid warping. Polymers AM has addressed this issue by using support material that is soluble in an electrolyte that the base material is not. In contrast, metals AM has traditionally approached support removal using time consuming, costly methods such as electrical discharge machining or a dremel.

This work introduces dissolvable supports to single- and multi-material metals AM. The multi-material approach uses material choice to design a functionally graded material where corrosion is the functionality being varied. The single-material approach is the primary focus of this thesis, leveraging already common post-print heat treatments to locally alter the microstructure near the surface. By including a sensitizing agent in the ageing heat treatment, carbon is diffused into the part decreasing the corrosion resistance to a depth equal to at least half the support thickness. In a properly chosen electrolyte, this layer is easily chemically, or electrochemically removed. Stainless steel 316 (SS316) and Inconel 718 are both investigated to study this process using two popular alloys. The microstructure evolution and corrosion properties are investigated for both. For SS316, the effect of applied electrochemical potential is investigated to describe the varying corrosion phenomena induced, and the effect of potential choice on resultant roughness. In summary, a new approach to remove supports from metal AM parts is introduced to decrease costs and further the field of metals AM by expanding the design space.