Sustainable Additive Manufacturing: Mechanical Response of Acrylonitrile-Butadiene-Styrene over Multiple Recycling Processes

Nectarios Vidakis, Markos Petousis, Athena Maniadi, Emmanuel Koudoumas, Achilles Vairis and John Kechagias
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Nectarios Vidakis: Mechanical Engineering Department, Hellenic Mediterranean University, 71410 Heraklion Crete, Greece
Markos Petousis: Mechanical Engineering Department, Hellenic Mediterranean University, 71410 Heraklion Crete, Greece
Athena Maniadi: Department of Materials Science and Technology, University of Crete, 70013 Heraklion Crete, Greece
Emmanuel Koudoumas: Electrical Engineering Department, Hellenic Mediterranean University, 71410 Heraklion Crete, Greece
Achilles Vairis: Mechanical Engineering Department, Hellenic Mediterranean University, 71410 Heraklion Crete, Greece
John Kechagias: General Department, University of Thessaly, 41500 Larissa, Greece

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 9, 1-15

Abstract: Sustainability in additive manufacturing refers mainly to the recycling rate of polymers and composites used in fused filament fabrication (FFF), which nowadays are rapidly increasing in volume and value. Recycling of such materials is mostly a thermomechanical process that modifies their overall mechanical behavior. The present research work focuses on the acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS) polymer, which is the second most popular material used in FFF-3D printing. In order to investigate the effect of the recycling courses on the mechanical response of the ABS polymer, an experimental simulation of the recycling process that isolates the thermomechanical treatment from other parameters (i.e., contamination, ageing, etc.) has been performed. To quantify the effect of repeated recycling processes on the mechanic response of the ABS polymer, a wide variety of mechanical tests were conducted on FFF-printed specimens. Regarding this, standard tensile, compression, flexion, impact and micro-hardness tests were performed per recycle repetition. The findings prove that the mechanical response of the recycled ABS polymer is generally improved over the recycling repetitions for a certain number of repetitions. An optimum overall mechanical behavior is found between the third and the fifth repetition, indicating a significant positive impact of the ABS polymer recycling, besides the environmental one.

Keywords: additive manufacturing; 3D printing; recycling; acrylonitrile-butadiene-styrene (ABS); material characterization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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