Feature Based Fabrication in Layered Manufacturing

To address the conflicting requirements between holding specified surface quality and decreasing build time in layered manufacturing, we present a feature-based fabrication methodology whereby the curvature effects are localized within each decomposed volume. However, staircase interaction between the boundaries of the decomposed neighboring volumes creates geometric incompatibility for deposition, which further results in undesired material properties. This paper proposes a novel concept, feature interaction volume, to eliminate the staircase interaction. Based on this concept, a feature based volume decomposition algorithm is developed. This algorithm enables each decomposed volume to be fabricated independently and compatibly. Implementation and example results are also presented. @DOI: 10.1115/1.1377282#