A review on benchmark artifacts for evaluating the geometrical performance of additive manufacturing processes

In recent years, additive manufacturing (AM) has undergone a rapid growth, therefore several processes based on different working principles (e.g. photopolymerization, sintering, extrusion, material jetting, etc) are now available and allow to manufacture parts using a wide range of materials. Consequently, the so-called benchmark artifacts are necessary to assess the capabilities and limitations of each AM process or to compare the performance of different processes. This paper focuses on the benchmark artifacts for evaluating the geometrical performance of AM processes and proposes an extensive review of the available literature, analyzing the design of such test parts in detail. The investigated test parts are classified according to the process aspect that they are able to evaluate (dimensional/geometrical accuracy, repeatability, minimum feature size) and the combination AM process/materials for which they have been used. In addition, the paper draws a summary of guidelines to design benchmark artifacts for geometrical performance evaluation.