Abstract
Direct Metal Deposition (DMD) is a new additive process producing three-dimensional metal components or tools directly from CAD data, which aims to take mold making and metalworking in an entirely new direction. It is the blending of five common technologies: lasers, CAD, CAM, sensors and materials. In the resulting process, alternatively called laser cladding, an industrial laser is used to locally heat a spot on a tool-steel work piece or platform, forming a molten pool of metal. A small stream of powdered tool-steel metal is then injected into the metal pool to increase the size of the molten pool. By moving the laser beam back and forth, under CNC control, and tracing out a pattern determined by a computerized CAD design, the solid metal part is eventually built line-by-line, one layer at a time. DMD produces improved material properties in less time and at a lower cost than is possible with traditional fabrication technologies.
