US 12,263,642 B2
Method and system for determining an amount of printing material powder in a multiobject build job
Gal Raz, Herzliya (IL)
Assigned to Siemens Industry Software Ltd., Tel Aviv (IL)
Appl. No. 17/782,709
Filed by Siemens Industry Software Ltd., Tel Aviv (IL)
PCT Filed Dec. 10, 2019, PCT No. PCT/IB2019/060597
§ 371(c)(1), (2) Date Jun. 6, 2022,
PCT Pub. No. WO2021/116729, PCT Pub. Date Jun. 17, 2021.
Prior Publication US 2023/0008161 A1, Jan. 12, 2023
Int. Cl. B29C 64/386 (2017.01); B33Y 50/00 (2015.01); G05B 19/4099 (2006.01)
CPC B29C 64/386 (2017.08) [B33Y 50/00 (2014.12); G05B 19/4099 (2013.01); G05B 2219/49023 (2013.01)] 12 Claims
OG exemplary drawing
 
1. A method for determining, by a data processing system, an amount of printing material powder for 3D printing an object in a build chamber of a multi-object printing job, the method comprises the following steps of:
receiving data on a 3D-model of the object, wherein the 3D-model data having at least data for determining a volume and a surface of the object;
receiving data on a thickness of a powder layer sticking around the object during printing, wherein a printed object surrounded by the powder layer is hereinafter referred as a dilated object;
receiving data on characteristics of the build chamber, wherein data on characteristics of the build chamber include at least data for determining a volume of a no build zone, which is a powder zone within the build chamber that cannot be used for building parts of the object, and a volume of a net build zone, which is a powder zone within the build chamber in which parts of the object are manufactured, and at least packing density data for determining an estimation of a volume of recyclable interstitial powder in a multi-object net build zone;
receiving data on a powder density and on a solid density of the printing material powder;
receiving data on a recycling ratio of the printing material powder, wherein the recycling ratio indicates an amount of powder that can be reused;
determining a volume of the powder layer around the object based on the 3D model data and on powder layer thickness data;
determining a dilated object contribution based on a ratio between volumes of the dilated object and of the net build zone;
determining an amount of used powder due the dilated object based on the solid density, on object volume, on the powder density and on the volume of the powder layer;
determining an amount of lost powder in the no build zone based on the recycling ratio, on the powder density and on the volume of the no build zone;
determining an amount of lost powder in the net build zone based on the recycling ratio, on the powder density and on the volume of the recyclable interstitial powder;
determining a contribution of the dilated object to an amount of total lost powder based on the dilated object contribution and on the lost powder amounts in both no build and net build zones; and
determining an amount of the printing material powder required for the 3D printing of the object based on the amount of the used powder due the dilated object and on the dilated object contribution to the amount of total lost powder.