Experimental Investigations for Optimizing the Extrusion Parameters on FDM PLA Printed Parts

Fused deposition modeling (FDM) has become one of the most extensively used additive manufacturing technologies in recent years because of its wide adaptability, simple mechanism and low cost. It is difficult, however, to achieve an equitable trade-off among mechanical properties, surface finish quality and production time, which is an area seldom explored. This paper concentrates on the optimization of the parameters to achieve higher tensile strength and lower surface roughness with less build time during the FDM process based on central composite design for the tensile specimen forming process. The effects of five extrusion parameters (nozzle diameter, liquefier temperature, extrusion velocity, filling velocity and layer thickness) on the three outputs of tensile strength (TS), surface roughness (SR) and build time (BT) are investigated. Response surface methodology combined with nondominated sorting genetic algorithm II is developed to optimize the process parameters to achieve the maximum TS, minimum SR and BT, as verified by subsequent experiments. The predicted results are found to be very close to the experimental data, illustrating that the presented approach in this paper is effective for improving mechanical properties, surface finish and efficiency of the FDM process.