REACTIVE EXTRUSION OF HIGH TEMPERATURE RESINS FOR ADDITIVE MANUFACTURING

摘要

The objective of this project was to produce high temperature thermoplastic and thermosetrnpolyimide resins as candidate materials for use in Additive Manufacturing (AM). Polyimidesrnamenable to a solvent-free process were produced via reactive extrusion in forms suitable forrnadditive manufacturing. High temperature polyimide resins were formulated to yield variedrnmolecular weights with reactive and nonreactive endcaps; such as phenylethynylphthalic grouprn(PEPA) and phthalic anhydride (PA), to promote and prevent cross linking respectively. Thisrneffort successfully demonstrated the viability of using reactive extrusion to produce highrntemperature polyimides directly both as filaments amenable to Fused Deposition Modelingrn(FDM) and as resin powders suitable for Selective Laser Sintering (SLS) in additivernmanufacturing.