Mechanical characterization and experimental modal analysis of 3D Printed ABS, PC and PC-ABS materials

Additive manufacturing (AM) process builds the parts, layer by layer precisely from Computer-Aided Design (CAD) models, whereas traditional subtractive manufacturing process removes layers from materials to attain the desired shape. Of late Rapid prototyped (RP) parts are used for the direct production of components for manufacturing and testing in the industries. Understanding material, machine used along with the process variables that affect the strength of the final part gains importance as the parts can be printed directly from CAD data and effectively integrated into structures. The main aim of this investigation is to present the mechanical characterization and free vibration analysis of various 3D printed Engineering Plastic Materials. Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene (ABS), Polycarbonate (PC), and Polycarbonate-Acrylonitrile Butadiene Styrene (PC-ABS) materials are used in this study. Spools are prepared from plastic pellets using wire extruder. Tensile tests have been performed on dog bone specimens to evaluate strength, fractured specimen's surfaces which are further evaluated using Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FESEM) to explore fracture of the raster and bonding between layers. From the experimental results it's noticed that the PC-ABS material exhibits improved elastic limit and load-carrying capacity compared with ABS and PC. Three types of beams are fabricated using different materials and modal analysis has been conducted to predict the stiffness of beams in terms of natural frequencies under clamped free (CF) and clamped clamped (CC) end conditions. Higher natural frequencies observed with PC-ABS is compared with the rest of the materials.