AmorFeTa

Bulk Metallic Glasses (BMG) are metallic alloys which - unlike metals - do not solidify crystalline but amorphous. As a result, they have a higher hardness and at the same time a higher elasticity than crystalline metals, which makes them ideal materials for many applications. Powders made from BMG are ideally suited for powder bed-based additive manufacturing: Here, very high cooling rates occur compared to other processes, making amorphous solidification of BMG easily achievable. Additive manufacturing in the PBF-LB process also makes it possible to implement fine structures and variable wall thicknesses of components in a single process step. BMG powders therefore offer themselves as an interesting alternative to the materials previously used in aerospace applications. The aim of the project is to qualify novel thin-walled lightweight aerospace applications and solid-state joints made of amorphous metals. To this end, extensive characterization and parameter optimization is first necessary in order to develop and manufacture, over several steps, first dense thin-walled samples with a homogeneous microstructure, then samples with sufficient mechanical characteristic values and finally topology-optimized demonstrators.