Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263

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Materials and Design

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Finite Element Simulation of Selective Laser Melting process considering

Optical Penetration Depth of laser in powder bed
Ali Foroozmehr a, Mohsen Badrossamay b, Ehsan Foroozmehr b,⁎, Sa’id Golabi a
a
Mechanical Engineering Department, Kashan University, Iran
b
Mechanical Engineering Department, Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: A three dimensional finite element model (FEM) is introduced in this work in order to simulate the melt pool size
Received 29 July 2015 during the Selective Laser Melting (SLM) process. The model adopts the Optical Penetration Depth (OPD) of laser
Received in revised form 30 September 2015 beam into the powder bed and its dependency on the powder size in definition of the heat source. The model is
Accepted 1 October 2015
used to simulate laser melting of a single layer of stainless steel 316L on a thick powder bed. The results of the
Available online 3 October 2015
model for the melt pool depth are validated with the experimental results. The model is then used to predict
Keywords:
the effect of different scanning speeds on the melt pool depth, width, and length. The results showed that the
Selective Laser Melting melt pool size varies from the beginning of a track to its end and from the first track to the next. The melt pool
Finite Element Simulation size, however, reaches a stable condition after a few tracks. This concept was used to simplify the process model-
Optical Penetration Depth ing in which reduces the computational costs.
Melt pool size © 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
AISI 316L

1. Introduction
Additive Manufacturing (AM) is referred to technologies that fabri-
cate directly three-dimensional objects in layer-by-layer fashion. Selec-
tive Laser Melting (SLM), as one of the powder bed fusion (PBF) AM
processes, enables production of complex metallic parts from a CAD
model. A schematic of a typical SLM process is depicted in Fig. 1. In
this process, in order to deposit powder layers with predefined thick-
ness, an amount of powder comes up to the build table and a roller or
blade spreads powder at the build platform. Full dense parts created
by scanning a high intensity laser beam in a special pattern and local
consolidation of the powder bed in successive layers. A neutral gas
flow, usually nitrogen or argon gas, protects molten pool from oxida-
tion. Nowadays, the flexibility of SLM process in manufacturing complex
parts with high quality has led to an increase in its applications in many
industries such as aerospace, medical, automotive and even jewelry.
Nonetheless, this process still faces challenges including relative densi-
ty, dimensional accuracy, surface quality, and thermal residual stresses.
Moving a large energy density of laser beam on powder bed causes a
high thermal gradient in the part, which may result in residual stress
and thermal cracking in the part [1].
Normally for fabrication of each component from the desired mate-
rial, choosing a set of appropriate process parameters such as laser
power, scan speed, hatch distance, and scanning pattern is necessary
to produce a part with acceptable dimensional accuracy and density
⁎ Corresponding author.
E-mail address: eforoozmehr@cc.iut.ac.ir (E. Foroozmehr).
[2]. On the other hand, geometry of the components has a decisive
role in dimensional accuracy. In other words, because of different heat
transfer conditions in each layer of the part as well as negligibly of
heat transfer through the powder bed [3], geometry of the part affects
the melt pool size significantly [2]. In addition, the melt pool size may
increase considerably in some regions of each layer such as, the first
track or U-turns in zigzag pattern [4]. Accordingly predicting the melt
pool size is necessary to improve dimensional accuracy of SLM parts.
In recent years, numerous numerical models have been used consid-
erably in predicting the effect of different process parameters on the
temperature and stress distribution as well as the melt pool size of
SLM. For instance, Matsumoto et al., proposed a two dimensional finite
element method for predicting temperature and stress distribution
within a single layer [6]. Yin et al. have used element birth and death
method to obtain the temperature distribution in a single layer [7].
There are, however, many challenges in modeling a complex process
such as SLM. The laser beam with uneven distribution of energy strikes a
surface covered with metal particles with different shape and size.
There are inevitable gaps among particles that let the laser beam pene-
trates through the powder bed. Consequently, the absorption of the
laser beam by the particles as well as the multiple reflections from the
surface of the particles causes the energy of the beam to be attenuated
within the powder bed. The powder shape and size, of course, has dra-
matic effect on the actual absorption of the laser energy by the powder
and the amount of penetration depth. Considering all these features
makes the simulation very tough or even impossible. Therefore, simpli-
fying assumptions have been applied in many SLM modeling efforts. Ma
et al. and Dai et al. used constant temperature to simulate the laser spot

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.matdes.2015.10.002
0264-1275/© 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
256 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263
Fig. 1. Selective Laser Melting (SLM) process overview [5].
in order to analyze the temperature and stress fields [8,9]. Xiao et al. and
Antony et al. used a constant heat flux to analyze the melting of the
powder bed [10,11]. An average uniform heat generation was used by
Contuzzi et al. [12] and Song et al. [13] to represent the heat source.
More accurate results were reported by Hussein et al. that supposed a
Gaussian volumetric heat generation to simulate the process in order
to obtain the melt pool size [14]. Ilin et al. used Goldak heat source in
a 2D analysis to predict the melt pool size and the temperature distribu-
tion [15].
Fig. 2. a) 3D Finite Element Model and scan strategy (Hs is the Hatch Space), b) the modeled laser spot.
The effect of powder size and distribution has been neglected in the
mentioned references. A number of experimental based investigations
have studied the effect of powder size and scanning speed on the actual
laser absorption by the powder. A ray tracing algorithm has been devel-
oped to describe laser power dissipation in depth of the powder in laser
micro sintering process [16]. Badrossamay et al. developed a model to
predict the absorption coefficient of the powder by considering the ef-
fect of scanning speed on the absorption coefficient of three types of
steel powder [17]. Energy distribution and thermal and optical penetra-
tion of the laser beam in nickel and titanium powder bed were evaluat-
ed by Fischer et al. [18].
In this paper, a 3D non-linear transient finite element model is pre-
sented to predict the temperature distribution and melt pool dimen-
sions in a multi-tracks pattern on powder substrate. In order to
improve the accuracy of the model, a practical method is introduced
to estimate the Optical Penetration Depth (OPD) into the powder bed.
The model is compared with the experimental results for validation. In
addition, the effect of three different scanning speeds on the melt pool
dimensions in various regions of a layer is discussed.
2. Finite element modelling
ANSYS® was used to simulate the heat transfer within the metal
powder during the SLM process. Fig. 2 shows geometry of the model,
mesh structure, and scanning strategy. A volumetric heat generation
with uniform distribution was introduced to represent the laser spot
(the top view can be seen in the detailed view of Fig. 2). The dimensions
of the square region were chosen so that the area of the laser spot in the
model is the same as the one with circular spot. A subroutine was
 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263 257

written based on APDL (ANSYS parametric design language) to simulate Uniform temperature distribution of 293 K (20 °C) throughout the
the moving laser spot over the surface. The continuous movement of the powder bed considered as the initial condition:
laser was simplified as incremental movement of the heat source at
each time-step. In each time-step, a certain number of elements were T ðx; y; z; t Þt¼0 ¼ 293 ðKÞ ð3Þ
selected with heat generation boundary condition. Once the solution
of each time-step was done, the nodes that has exceeded the melting Because of the thick powder bed and low conductivity of the pow-
point were selected, and then the material properties of the elements der, and in order to decrease the solution time, the base plate was not
attached to the node was switched from “powder” to “solid.” The crite- modeled. The top surface boundary condition is described by:
rion for this change was the solidus temperature of the material. The  
process continued until the whole length of the track was treated. ∂T
k ¼ Q  hðT  T s Þ ð4Þ
Then, the spot was moved toward Y direction and a new track began. ∂z z¼1
The incremental nature of the simulation process can affect the melt
pool depth prediction. In practice, once the laser hits the powder bed, a where, h is convective heat transfer coefficient (W/m2K) supposed to be
thin layer of molten material is formed. The molten material then, trans- 10 for the top surface as a natural convection [14], and Ts is surface tem-
fers the heat to the beneath layer and causes deeper molten pool. In the perature (K). As Refs. [16,19] suggested, radiation heat transfer is ig-
simulation process, if the solution is considered only for one time-step, nored in this model. Vaporization and melt pool phenomenon such as
the calculated molten pool depth is less than the actual one due to the Marangoni convection is also ignored in this model.
low conductivity of the powder. To overcome this problem, each time-
step is divided into some smaller sub-steps in which the change in the 2.2. AISI 316L material properties
material properties from “powder” to “solid” occurs. Primary investiga-
tions showed that two time increments (n = 2 in Eq. (1)) would be ac- As mentioned before, in this model two phases of powder and solid
curate enough for the prediction of the melt pool depth. Eq. (1) shows considered. Thermal material properties in solid phase were used from
the relation between the time of each step, number of step divisions Ref. [20]. The conductivity of powder is supposed to be 1% of the solid
(n), time-increment, the amount of movement along X direction (Δx) thermal conductivity in this model based on the results reported by
and the scanning speed (V). Refs. [4,21] (Eq. (5)).

0:01  ksolid ; Tb1648 K
 kpowder ¼ ð5Þ
Timestep ¼ n  Timeincrement ¼ Δx
ð1Þ ksolid ; T≥1648 K
V

The 3D meshed part by dimensions of 7.17 × 4 × 1 mm has two re- As the powder bed is considered to be a mixture of solid (AISI 316L
gion (Fig. 2): a region where laser scans the powder bed with dimension particles) and gas (air) phases, the density of loose powder could be
of 2.112 × 5.28 mm (the scan region) containing element size equal to written as [22]:
66 μm from SOLID70, and the region that represents the powder sub-
ρm ¼ ∅ρ f þ ð1  ∅Þρs ð6Þ
strate filled with coarser free mesh from the same element type. The
layer is scanned with four tracks and raster pattern (Fig. 2). The process
where, ∅ is the ratio of the cross-sectional area occupied by the gas to
parameters are listed in Table 1. The laser spot consists of 64 elements
the total cross-sectional area of the medium; ρf is the density of gas
(8× 8).
phase and ρs is the density of solid phase. ∅ for tapped powder bed is
assumed to be 0.4 [23].
2.1. Thermal modeling The volumetric heat capacity of powder bed in terms of two phases,
solid and gas, could be written as [22]:
The thermal equilibrium equation for three-dimensional heat trans-
 
fer in a material with isotropic thermal properties can be described by:
ρm C m ¼ ð1  ∅Þðρs C s Þ þ ∅ ρ f C f ð7Þ

     
∂T ∂ ∂T ∂ ∂T ∂ ∂T where, Cm and Cf and Cs (J/kg K) are heat capacity of powder bed, gas
ρc ¼Qþ k þ k þ k ð2Þ
∂t ∂x ∂x ∂y ∂y ∂z ∂z phase (air) and solid phase (316L), respectively. According to Eq. (7),
heat capacity of metal powder is almost equal to heat capacity of solid
phase. Experiments also confirm this result [24].
where, ρ is material density (kg/m3); c is specific heat capacity (J/kg K); The temperature dependent material properties of the powder and
T is temperature (K); t is interaction time of powder and heat source (s); solid are depicted in Fig. 3, according to Eqs. (3) and (4). The abrupt
Q(x,y,z,t) is heat generation per unit volume (W/m3) and k is thermal change in material properties of powder and solid at melting tempera-
conductivity (W/m K). ture shows the transition of powder to liquid state.

2.3. Heat source modeling

Table 1
FEM parameters.
When the Gaussian laser beam is exposed to the powder bed, it ex-
Material and process parameters Values periences multiple reflections through the powder layers. Such phe-
Laser power, P (W) 110 nomenon causes drastic deviation from the Gaussian distribution of
Spot diameter, D (mm) 0.6 energy beneath the top surface. Based on the reports of Ref. [18], a uni-
Layer thickness, T (mm) 1 form energy distribution could be assumed for the heat source. On the
Scan speed, V mm/s 80, 100, 150
other hand, the porous powder medium causes a penetration depth of
Track length (mm) 4.5
Overlap 50% the energy into the powder layers [18]. Fig. 4 shows a scheme of laser
Material AISI 316L beam scattering through the powder bed. Estimating correct value for
Powder size (μm) [17] −45 the OPD is very important for the numerical simulation of the process.
Absorption rate of powder, A [17] 0.52 Generally, scattering of the laser beam in powder bed may be occurred
Latent heat of fusion (KJ/Kg) [20] 300
in four ways during interaction of laser beam and powder bed:
258 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263

Fig. 3. Thermal material properties of AISI 316L powder and solid: a) Conductivity, b) Density; c) Specific heat capacity for powder and solid phase.

transmission, forward scattering, backward scattering, and entirely ab-

Fig. 4. interaction of Laser and powder bed in SLM process [1].
sorption of the laser beam [16]. All these phenomena take part during
the melting process. The probability of occurring each of these phenom-
ena depends on powder size, powder bed density, and material proper-
ties [16].
The OPD is defined as the depth where the intensity of the laser en-
ergy reduces to 1/e (≅37%) of the intensity of the absorbed laser beam at
the powder bed surface [25]. It has been shown that for materials with
similar absorption value the OPD of powder bed is highly affected by
granulometric properties such as powder size and shape [18]. For in-
stance, according to experimental investigations of Ref. [18], the OPD
in spherical Ni powder with size of −20 μm is measured to be 20 μm,
while it is 200 μm for powder size of 50–75 μm. In addition, the absorp-
tion of Ni and Fe is in a same range [26]. Therefore, for the current spher-
ical powder of AISI 316L with particle size of −45 μm, the OPD can be
estimated by interpolating the mentioned results that is about 170 μm.
The power intensity decreases as the beam penetrates through the
powder bed. In order to consider such effect, and at the same time for
simplifying the model, a uniform heat generation is applied down to
an effective depth of penetration, which is a fraction of the considered
OPD. The ratio of the effective penetration depth to the OPD is defined
 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263
Fig. 5. Calculation of layer thickness in experiment sample and model results for depth in velocity of 100 mm/s: A) a part of sample cross section; B) overview of back surface of the sample
layer and the section location; C) Temperature distribution in cross section at end of the 4th track.
by α. The effective penetration depth that is determined by trial and
error and comparison with average thickness of the experimental sam-
ple in scan speed of 100 mm/s (the model calibration step) is defined to
be 120 μm that leads α to be 120/170 ≈ 0.706. Therefore, the heat gen-
eration amount used in the model is described by Eq. (8):
HG ¼ ðA  P Þ=V; V ¼ S  ðα  OPDÞ
where, A is absorption coefficient, P is laser power (W), V is the volume
exposed by laser beam (m3), S is area of laser spot (m2), and α is correc-
tion factor for assuming uniform heat generation. It is clear that the ab-
sorption coefficient depends on the material properties and the laser
beam wavelength [27]. Based on the earlier study in [17], the absorption
coefficient for 316L powder size of -45 μm exposed to a CO2 laser was
found to be 0.52. In order to determine the value of α, a calibration pro-
cedure is defined. In the next section, this procedure and the method of
its verification are explained in details.
2.4. Model calibration and validation
The FE model were calibrated and the results were verified using the
earlier conducted experimental results reported in [24]. AISI 316L
stainless steel gas-atomized powder with particle diameter of
−45 μm, supplied by Osprey Metals Ltd., UK, was used to prepare pow-
der beds of area 120 mm × 150 mm and 5 mm depth. Square areas
15 mm × 15 mm were melted in the beds' surface by a raster-
scanning CO2 laser, focused to a beam diameter of 0.6 mm, with the ex-
perimental home-made SLM apparatus under an argon atmosphere.
The SLM machine has been described in Refs. [27,28]. Laser power of
110 W was used, with scan speeds from 0.5 to 300 mm/s. The raster
Table 2
Comparison of experimental and FE model results in scan speed of 100 mm/s.
Average layer thickness of the experimental sample (μm)
Average molten pool depth of the FE model (μm)
Error
259
scans were parallel to a side of the square area, with scan spacing of
0.30 mm (half of the beam diameter that means 50% overlap).
The length and number of the modeled tracks should ideally be the
same as that of the fabricated specimens. However, such model imposes
high computational costs. As a result, a series of investigations have
been carried out in order to scale down the size of modeled tracks.
Based on the cross section images of the produced tracks, after the
ð8Þ
fourth track, the layer thickness does not show significant changes. In
addition, it has been found that the predicted temperature at the begin-
ning of the tracks stays almost constant after the fourth track (results
are presented in the next section). Therefore, it seems that modeling
four tracks may provide adequate information about the melt pool
size and temperature distribution.
In order to investigate the influence of decreased modeled track
length on the results, two models with different boundary conditions
were compared. Both models assume a track length of 4.5 mm
(10.5 mm shorter than the actual experiments), and scanning speed of
100 mm/s. In order to consider the temperature history effects of the
trimmed section, two extreme conditions were compared. In the first
case, the laser stays on for 0.105 s. at the end of the track (equivalent
time needed the laser to scan the 10.5 mm). Right after that, the laser
heat source jumps to the next track. In the second case, the laser goes
off for 0.105 s. at the end of the track (similar equivalent time). Then it
jumps to the next track. The temperature history at the beginning and
the middle of the track are compared for these two cases. The results
show that the temperature has less than 2% difference for the two
cases. This observation implies that due to the low conductivity of the
powder and very small cross section of the melted material, the heat
from processing the 10.5 mm of the end of the track has almost no effect
Table 3
Comparison between average values of the samples layer thickness and the model melt
pool depth, in scan speeds of 80 and 150 mm/s.
Scan speed 80 mm/s 150 mm/s
230.6 Experiment (μm) 355 200.4
234.3 FE model (μm) 306.3 178.5
1.6% Error 13.7% 10.8%
260 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263
Fig. 6. Temperature distribution at end of the process in: a) velocity of 80 mm/s; b) velocity of 100 mm/s; c) and velocity of 150 mm/s.
on the temperature of the first 4.5 mm of the track. Therefore, it was
concluded that a model with 4.5 mm could be accurate enough to
model the full-scale experiment.
The sample made at 100 mm/s scanning speed is shown in Fig. 5-b.
As can be seen, it is relatively rough and the tracks can be distinguished.
In order to measure the thickness of the produced layer accurately, the
cross section of the sample was analyzed. Fig. 5-a shows a portion of the
cross section. Over 50 data was collected from the thickness of the sam-
ple throughout the section. The average was considered as the “experi-
ment layer thickness”. In order to calibrate the model, the melt pool
depth in the model was compared with the measured thickness. A
view of the predicted melt pool depth can be seen in Fig. 5-c. The aver-
age of the melt pool depth at the end of tracks in the FE model was con-
sidered as the “model layer thickness”. As can be seen in Table 2, less
than 2% is the deviation of the model from the experiment. It is worth
noting that this result is achieved by considering α to be 0.706. This
value is considered the same for other scanning speeds.
The validation of the model was performed by comparing the
modeling results of 80 and 150 mm/s with the experiments. Measure-
ments showed the layer thickness of the experiments was between
325 and 385 μm for scan speed of 80 mm/s, and between 171 and
231 μm for 150 mm/s. Table 3 shows the comparison of the average
thickness of the experiments and the model for two speeds of 80 and
150 mm/s.
As can be seen, the model has a noticeable, yet acceptable, error from
the experiments. Further investigations showed that if in calculation of
the layer thickness in the FE model the first track is ignored, the error is
reduced to 3.9 and 1.2% for 80 and 150 mm/s, respectively. In other
Fig. 7. Heating and cooling cycle during the scanning process of six tracks in scan speed of 150 mm/s; (1)–(6) Start of first to sixth track.
words, the melt pool depth prediction of the first track has the maxi-
mum deviation from the experiment. To better understanding the rea-
son of such phenomenon, one should consider the fact that during
melting the first track, powder presents on both sides of the track,
while for other tracks, one side is powder and the other side is melted
material. The convective flows of the molten pool, which is ignored in
the current FE model, causes powder particles to be grabbed into the
molten pool. The first track behaves differently because powder parti-
cles are on both sides of the track, and therefore, deeper and wider
melt pool is generated. More details about melt pool size would be
discussed in the next section.
3. Results and discussion
3.1. Temperature distribution
As a result of applying laser power to the powder bed, a very high
temperature gradient occurs. Fig. 6 shows the temperature distribution
at the end of the forth track for three cases of 80, 100, 150 mm/s scan-
ning speed. The color code is set so that the temperature higher than
the melting point is in gray color. Therefore, the difference in the melt-
ing zone can be distinguished at the end of the forth track. The maxi-
mum temperatures at the end of the process are predicted to be 2170,
2123, and 1902 K for scan speeds of 80, 100, and 150 mm/s, respectively.
Increasing the scanning speed reduces the maximum temperatures.
This temperature is well above the melting temperature. Similar obser-
vation had been reported in former studies in which the temperature
distribution and densification process of SLM was modeled [14,29].
 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263 261

Similar to SLM process, the temperature beneath the heat source can go
over the melting point as reported for electron beam melting (EBM)
[30] and laser metal powder deposition (LMPD) [31]. The melt pool
size, also, gets smaller as the scanning speed increases. This effect is il-
lustrated in Fig. 6 by setting the color code at 1648 K. The width and
length of the melt pool are analyzed in more details in the next section.
Fig. 7 shows the temperature vs. time for the middle point at the be-
ginning of each track during the process in scan speed of 150 mm/s.
Each point experiences a peak temperature of over 1700 K. Because of
the 50% overlap between each two adjacent tracks, after the first two
tracks, during scanning of each track, temperature of start point of the
previous track exceeds melt temperature. Short time of the scanning
process and low conductivity of powder bed cause the temperature of
about 1400 K at the end of the process. One of the important points
shown in Fig. 7 is that after the fourth track almost no deference ob-
served in maximum reached temperatures. According to this diagram,
maximum temperature occurred at the start of the first track. This is
due to the fact that the first track has the minimum heat sink [4].
3.2. Melt pool size
Fig. 8 shows the depth, width, and length of molten pool at start,
middle and end of each track in various scan speeds (Fig. 8-a). As indi-
cated in Fig. 8-b, the depth of the melt pool varies depending on the

Fig. 8. Melt pool size in different points of powder bed and in various scan speeds; a) Position of the points on powder bed; b) Melt pool depth in various scan speeds and positions; c) Melt
pool width in various scan speeds and positions; d) Melt pool length in various scan speeds and positions.
262 A. Foroozmehr et al. / Materials and Design 89 (2016) 255–263
location on each track and the track number, because of different heat
transfer conditions. Considering the lowest scanning speed, the melt
pool depth increases from location 1 to 2 due to heat accumulation.
But, from 2 to 3 it reaches a steady state condition. The beginning of
the second track shows an increase in the depth (location 4) that con-
tinues to a higher value at location 5. The heating effect of the first
track causes this increase in the melt pool depth. Similar to the first
track, the middle and the end of the second track also show almost con-
stant values. The beginning of the third track, however, experiences a
drop in the depth. This can be explained by the heat sink effect of the
formed tracks. The mass of the first two tracks is large enough to extract
the heat effectively and cause a reduction in the melt pool depth at loca-
tion 7. By moving the laser forward on the third track, the melt pool gets
deeper. Similar observation presents for the fourth track. The heat sink
effect for location 10 makes the depth at this point to be even a little
smaller than 7. The rest of the fourth track shows similar depth as the
third one.
The energy balance between the heat input and the heat sink deter-
mines the dimensions of the melt pool. The moving nature of the heat
source makes the temperature history to play an important role in the
properties of the melt pool. Well understanding the energy balance in
the process helps finding proper parameters for making sound parts.
Therefore, the depth, width, and length for each track and three loca-
tions of the beginning, middle, and end of the track is discussed.
The melt pool width shows a similar trend as the melt pool depth
(Fig. 8-c). By increasing the scanning speed, the width of the melt pool
decreases. The minimum width is located at the beginning of each track
(locations 1, 4, 7, and 10). The middle and the end of each track show
larger width than the beginning. The width of the track increases for
about 200 μm from the first track to the second one, and about 100 μm
from second to the third, and about 50 μm from third to the fourth. It
can be concluded that the width is reached to its steady state condition
at the fourth or fifth track. The length of the melt pool on each track is
shown in Fig. 8-d. The beginning of every track has a small length. As
the beam progresses, the length increases in all speeds. The length of
the melt pool from the first track up to track three shows an increasing
trend. The third and fourth track, however, behave similarly.
As indicated in analysis of the depth, width, and length of the melt
pool, the fourth track follows the properties of the third track. Therefore,
the assumption of considering only four tracks out of 25 in order to re-
duce the computational costs, and yet obtaining an accurate model is
confirmed. In spite of considering the thermal effects of the heat input
on the powder bed, the fluid flow in the melt pool has been neglected.
Such simplification causes some deviations from the experiments. As in-
dicated by Ref. [32], instabilities in the melt pool due to surface tension
gradient would cause unevenness of the surface. In higher velocities,
such effects are more sever that may even lead to discontinuity and
making individual droplets (balling effect).
Based on the presented results, the melt pool depth and width varies
over time during the process. In order to increase the accuracy of the
part and minimizing the variations of the melt pool dimensions, online
monitoring and controlling the process have been adopted. Mercelis re-
ported two methods of using camera and photo diode to monitor the
melt pool size [21]. While the mentioned methods capture the data
from the top surface of the melt pool, the main goal is to control the
depth of the melt pool (layer thickness). The modeling results imply
that the rate of change in the width of the melt pool by altering the
speed is not the same as that of the depth. Therefore, the closed loop
control methods should consider such differences by similar analysis
to determine the proper relationship between process parameters and
the depth of the melt pool.
4. Conclusions
In this paper, a finite element model of the SLM process was devel-
oped. The Optical Penetration Depth of the laser beam in powder bed
was considered in defining the heat source. The model was used to pre-
dict the melt pool dimensions of a single layer on powder bed of mate-
rial stainless steel 316 L. Experimental data were used to calibrate the
effective Optical Penetration Depth. The calibrated model, then, was val-
idated by further experiments. The modeling results indicated good
agreement with experiments. Temperature distribution and depth,
width, and length of the melt pool were evaluated in each track and
the results were analyzed for scan speeds of 80, 100, and 150 mm/s.
The results showed that the melt pool dimensions reached a steady con-
dition after the third track. In addition, the melt pool depth of each track
stayed almost constant after about 2 mm from the beginning of the
track. More experimental investigations, are needed to see the effects
of process parameters such as power and scan speed on OPD and ab-
sorption rate simultaneously and for various powder materials.
Acknowledgments
The experimentation of this work had been carried out at University
of Leeds, UK, during the PhD study of one of the authors (MB) who is
grateful for the support of Prof. TH.C. Childs as his supervisor, as well
as the Iranian Ministry of Research, Science and Education for a
scholarship.
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