Date of Award

Spring 5-9-2025

Level of Access Assigned by Author

Open-Access Thesis

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Mechanical Engineering

First Committee Advisor

Bashir Khoda

Second Committee Member

Masoud Rais-Rohani

Third Committee Member

Phillip King

Abstract

Additive manufacturing (AM) has revolutionized the manufacturing industry by increasing the ease and intricacy of manufacturable structures. With the cost of large-scale additive manufacturing so high, printing segmented structures can be a possible method to overcome these limitations. This work aims to present a framework for the printing of structures larger than a traditional printer envelope. Segments of structures can be printed, folded or otherwise manipulated to construct a larger structure bypassing the limitations of smaller printer envelopes. Printing faces onto a flexible substrate such as a textile can be used as a hinge to hold faces together. A net of a polyhedron can be folded from a 2D plane of finite thickness into a 3D structure. Printing faces of a polyhedron net at the size of the print bed can greatly increase the size of manufacturable objects. A chain net is a net that is unfolded in a linear fashion such that each face is connected to a maximum of two others, preventing interference with printer topology. Finding a chain net of convex polyhedron can be simplified to a Hamiltonian pathfinding problem on the dual graph of the polyhedron. However, some polyhedron nets are not as optimal to print as others, requiring the application of a cost function to be optimized via a depth-first search. Other objectives and constraints for these problems are investigated and discussed.

Volumetric enhancement of 2D objects is also possible, requiring a planar division algorithm. Lloyd’s Algorithm is suitable for the segmentation of 2D shapes. Similar to 3D, constraints for manufacturing 2D objects can be implemented. To further tailor the printing process to the problem, a custom slicing method was implemented. The slicing methodology is discussed, either reducing or eliminating potential errors compounded from using black box functions. The slicer allows for full control over the process of perimeter and infill generation, allowing for variation in the infill density and infill pattern settings to be no infill, rectilinear, aligned rectilinear, line, or spiral. The slicer implements interlayer variation in the printing parameters, allowing the setting for the first layer to differ, maximizing part adhesion to the flexible substrate.

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