Tailor-made functional composite components using AM and HIP

The combination of Additive Manufacturing (AM) and Hot Isostatic Pressing (HIP) offers great potential for industrial applications. Skillfully connecting AM and HIP creates a manufacturing process that unites the advantages of both processes. We demonstrate a production route for composite components by AM + HIP. A capsule made of wear-resistant or corrosion-resistant steel is additively manufactured by Laser-Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF). Before building, the geometry of the capsule is optimized by FEM simulation to obtain a desired shape. In a second step, the capsule is filled with structural steel powder and sealed in a conventional powder HIP process. The capsule remains on the component as an outer layer. In this way a complex-shaped, functional net shape composite component is produced. The composite components created by this route are characterized by metallographic investigations.