Effect of interlayer temperature and cold wire addition in Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing on carbon steel

Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing (WAMM) consists in the manufacture of metallic preforms from the deposition of multilayer weld beads on a substrate, that is, from a three-dimensional model, the object is divided into layers defining the trajectories in which the addition of metal will be made, with the use of a robotic manipulator. The objective of this work is to study the influence of the addition of cold wire and the effect of interlayer temperature in the WAAM process, comparing it with the deposition made with a single wire, observing mechanical properties such as tensile strength, hardness, in addition to the cooling time for different interlayer temperatures and the geometry of the manufactured parts. A GMAW (Gas Metal Arc Welding) system was used coupled to a robotic manipulator, with multiple wires of 1.6 mm in diameter for the energized wire and 1.0 mm for the cold wire, both classified as ER70S-6. In order to manufacture the specimens for the tensile test, 20 layers were superimposed in a straight line, forming a wall, varying the interlayer temperature between each layer, using 100°C, 150°C and directly, with no waiting interval between layers. In general, a shorter cooling time was observed for the walls manufactured with the addition of cold wire when compared to depositions with a single wire. In addition, it was noted that the cold wire also influences the height and thickness of the pieces. In the mechanical tests, the cold wire did not significantly influence the hardness values. The highest values were found in the 100°C samples. For the tensile tests, it was observed that, in general, the addition of cold wire tended to increase the maximum tensile strength of the samples.