Investigation of high temperature behavior of AlSi10Mg produced by selective laser melting

Among additive manufacturing (AM) processes, Selective Laser Melting (SLM) is the most diffused layer by layer method for manufacturing 3D components. It is based on local melting, induced by a laser scanning, on a powder bed; the limited dimensions of the liquid pool provoke rapid cooling rates which can be associated to significantly finer microstructure than the one obtained by a conventional casting process. Moreover, being the remelting of pre-existing pools, it is of relevant interest to investigate the wettability and the reactivity at high temperature of alloys produced by SLM. In the panorama of alloys for AM, the AlSiMg system is one of the most used, as it belongs to wide family of the Al-Si alloys, extensively used for conventional casting and die-casting technologies, and it offers good weldability. Therefore, the present work has the goal of investigating the high temperature behavior of the SLMed AlSiMg parts. Wettability tests on AlO plates were performed considering two different atmospheres (vacuum and Argon) and the contact angle results compared; surface morphology together with the microstructures and the chemical composition variations were analyzed.