Method of smoothing the surface of additively manufactured polylactide by thermal treatment in sodium chloride

Abstract

The paper contains a study of the influence of thermal treatment of the 3D-printed polylactide parts in sodium chloride dust on the surface roughness of the manufactured part. The conducted experiment features annealing with the use of two different sizes of NaCl crystals and two levels of temperature. All the samples were made with natural polylactic acid filament using the fused deposition modeling (FDM) method. The samples were put into a salt scaffold and placed in the electric furnace to remelt the surface of the part while keeping pressure on the walls to prevent unwanted deformation. The results show that it is possible to improve the quality of additively manufactured component’s surfaces as long as optimal parameters are applied.