A Combined Experimental and Modeling Study for Pellet-Fed Extrusion-Based Additive Manufacturing to Evaluate the Impact of the Melting Efficiency

To improve the product quality of polymeric parts realized through extrusion-based additive manufacturing (EAM) utilizing pellets, a good control of the melting is required. In the present work, we demonstrate the strength of a previously developed melt removal using a drag framework to support such improvement. This model, downscaled from conventional extrusion, is successfully validated for pellet-based EAM—hence, micro-extrusion—employing three material types with different measured rheological behavior, i.e., acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS), polylactic acid (PLA) and styrene-ethylene-butylene-styrene polymer (SEBS). The model’s validation is made possible by conducting for the first time dedicated EAM screw-freezing experiments combined with appropriate image/data analysis and inputting rheological data. It is showcased that the (overall) processing temperature is crucial to enable similar melting efficiencies. The melting mechanism can vary with the material type. For ABS, an initially large contribution of viscous heat dissipation is observed, while for PLA and SEBS thermal conduction is always more relevant. It is highlighted based on scanning electron microscopy (SEM) analysis that upon properly tuning the finalization of the melting point within the envisaged melting zone, better final material properties are achieved. The model can be further used to find an optimal balance between processing time (e.g., by variation of the screw frequency) and material product performance (e.g., strength of the printed polymeric part).