The University of British Columbia

Published purpose

The purpose of this project is to carry out a feasibility study of using wire-arc additive manufacturing (WAAM) to produce ultra-wear-resistant parts for mining operations. The overall project objective is to evaluate whether the relatively low-cost WAAM process is able to produce these mining parts with satisfactory dimensional accuracy, surface finish, and crack- and wear-resistant properties. The research work involves the development of a trajectory planning system to generate the complex 3D trajectories for the robotic welding systemto produce a given mining part shape. The trajectories of the welding robot are to be generated by considering two main factors: (1) dynamics of the robot in motion; and (2) deposited shape of the welded material. These two factors will be studied experimentally by performing a large number of WAAM tests. It is expected that empirical cause-effect relationships will be derived from the test results to facilitate the trajectory planning of the robotic welding system.