Laser Additive Layer Manufacturing of tiles in various nickel superalloys has been demonstrated at TRL4. Considerable investment has been made in developing materials data for the processes of record employed on the current generation of equipment, however this equipment is for general purpose prototyping and is not capable of high volume, low cost production of flight parts.

The objective of this project was to develop a second-generation machine suitable for low cost manufacture while maintaining process equivalence to the current processes of record. This was achieved by the use of multiple lasers to address a larger build envelope and was otherwise in line with the capability requirements stated in the topic call.

The Participants first agreed the requirements for the machine with the Topic Manager. From this a functional specification was developed, embodying the essential design concepts to be realised. A test rig was constructed and operated in order to explore methods for controlling the overlap areas between laser fields. An alpha system was designed, constructed and tested in accordance with the functional specification and incorporating the learning from the test rig. A subsequent prototype machine, being a development of the alpha machine, was designed built & tested prior to installation in a representative production environment. Validation testing was performed on this machine in order to establish (1) metallurgical equivalence to the current processes of record, (2) accuracy, in particular in overlap regions, (3) system reliability and (4) cost of ownership metrics.