Effects of Contaminations on Electric Arc Behavior and Occurrence of Defects in Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing of 316L-Si Stainless Steel

Additive Manufacturing is a manufacturing process that consists of obtaining a three-dimensional object from the deposition of material layer by layer, unlike conventional subtractive manufacturing methods. Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing stands out for its high productivity among the Additive Manufacturing technologies for manufacturing metal parts. On the other hand, the excessive heat input promotes increased residual stress levels and the occurrence of defects, such as pores, voids, a lack of fusion, and delamination. These defects result in abnormalities during the process, such as disturbances in electrical responses. Therefore, process monitoring and the detection of defects and failures in manufactured items are of fundamental importance to ensure product quality and certify the high productivity characteristic of this process. Thus, this work aimed to characterize the effects of different contaminations on the electric arc behavior of the Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing process and the occurrence of microscopic defects in thin walls manufactured by this process. To investigate the presence of defects in the metal preforms, experimental conditions were used to promote the appearance of defects, such as the insertion of contaminants. To accomplish the electric arc behavior analysis, voltage and current temporal data were represented through histograms and cyclograms, and the arc stability was assessed based on the Vilarinho index for a short circuit. Effectively, the introduction of contaminants caused electric arc disturbances that led to the appearance of manufacturing defects, such as inclusions and porosities, observed through metallographic characterization. The results confirm that the introduction of contaminations could be identified early in the Wire Arc Additive Manufacturing process through electric arc data analysis.