Anisotropic Tensile Failure Model of Rapid Prototyping Parts - Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM)

Abstract

Stratasys' Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) is a typical Rapid Prototyping (RP) process that can fabricate prototypes out of plastic materials, and the parts made from FDM were often used as load-carrying elements. Because FDM deposits materials in about 300 μm thin filament with designated orientation, parts made from FDM show anisotropic material behaviors. This paper proposes an analytic model to predict the tensile strength of FDM parts. Applying the Classical Lamination Theory and Tsai-Wu failure criterion, which were developed for laminated composite materials, a computer code was implemented to predict the failure of the FDM parts. The tensile strengths predicted by the analytic model were compared with those of the experimental data. The data and predicted values agreed reasonably well to prove the validity of the model.