MODIFICATION OF POWDER MATERIAL FOR 3D PRINTING USING DRY GRANULATION

Additive technologies currently represent progressive technologies, both in the field of manufacturing itself and in materials engineering, where the main source is powder material. Powder material as a source material is characterized by the mechanical, physical and flow properties of fine powders. Targeted modification of these properties represents a research challenge in this area with the aim of creating a granulate with the required properties. This article compares selected mechanical, physical and flow properties of the original powder material used for 3D printing with the created granulate. The granulate was created by a process of high-pressure compaction between the rolls of a compactor and subsequent dry granulation on a patented flat-die granulator to create a granulate with a narrow particle size distribution. The result is an assessment of the improvement in flow properties for possible material recycling and reuse of the raw material for further processing using 3D printing.