Experimental Investigation on Hardness, Microstructure and Surface Roughness of Maraging Steel Parts Produced by Direct Metal Laser Sintering Technique

Direct metal laser sintering (DMLS) is an additive manufacturing technique used to fabricate metal parts directly from the computer- aided design (CAD) data without any further machining operations. The DMLS technique is used in various applications in aerospace, automotive, medical and tooling industries. In this view, this paper presents an investigation of the hardness, surface roughness and microstructure of maraging steel parts produced by DMLS technique. The input process parameters, i.e. laser power, scan speed and hatching space were selected and conducted experimentation based on Taguchi design. The hardness, microstructure and surface roughness of the parts were analyzed before and after heat treatment and sandblasting.