In this case study with Renishaw, we uncover how the varying temperatures throughout a furnace have a significant impact on the mechanical properties of AM parts, in this case showing over 10% variation in yield strength, and how these findings have led Renishaw to optimise their heat treatment process, ensuring consistency and increasing confidence in part performance.

Where machining tensile specimens for testing is not an option, hardness is often considered as a solution. This poses a significant limitation; while hardness testing offers advantages such as affordability, speed, ease of use, and suitability for testing small specimens, a hardness number is not a fundamental material property. Furthermore, practitioners are limited to conversions into a limited set of material property values, as hardness numbers cannot give full stress-strain curves, which means that without further information finite element modelling cannot always be conducted accurately.

Cost and time constraints have shaped the conventional workflow in Additive Manufacturing (AM) parameter development, separating parameter down-selection from mechanical property assessment. Yet, this method, aimed at discovering optimal parameters, is inherently flawed. It exposes projects to expensive delays and squandered innovation opportunities due to initial data shortages, potentially misleading results, and unexpected material behaviour. Could prioritising mechanical properties from the outset offer a solution, and is such an approach feasible in practice?