An adaptive slicing algorithm and data format for functionally graded material objects

摘要

Rapid prototyping technology makes the manufacturing of functionally graded material (FGM) objects possible. The FGM production process requires concurrent applications of digital design and manufacturing methods. For this reason, it is imperative to construct and capture information and other critical data regarding the geometry and materials about FGM objects for use in the manufacturing process. This paper proposes a simplex-clear data format for modeling FGM objects. This proposed data format captures both the geometry and material information of an FGM object. It also presents a finite element-based slicing algorithm which slices the FGM object into layers and captures each layer's information for rapid prototyping manufacturing of the object. An example is given at the end of the paper to validate the data format and demonstrate the adaptive slicing algorithm.