Crack inhibition to enhance the tensile and impact strength of additively manufactured CuCrZr alloy

Abstract This research focuses on enhancing the tensile and impact strength (IS) of the LPBF-based CuCrZr alloy parts based on crack inhibition. Also, it focuses on reducing the gas entrapment percentage while printing the parts which was the primary cause for crack nucleation. Three influential LPBF constraints, such as Print Orientation (PO), Layer Thickness (LT), and Hatching Range (HR), were examined to eliminate the gas entrapment, which was the primary reason affecting the structural integrity of the printed parts. Entropy - Deng’s similarity approach was embraced to find satisfactory conditions for printing the copper alloy parts. The overlapped, un-overlapped, and fused particle nano hardness analyses were examined. The results show that the overlapping zone had 17.5% greater nano-hardness than the fused particles. Moreover, the UTS of 376.57 MPa and IS of 14.85 J with a reduced gas entrapment percentage of 0.17% was witnessed during the implementation of 90° print orientation with reduced layer thickness and hatching range of 25 μm and 0.03 mm.