Acoustic Materials Additive Manufacturing System

Title: Acoustic Materials Additive Manufacturing SystemThis proposal to the Defense University Research Instrumentation Program (DURIP) outlines the acquisition and assembly of a system that will be used to additively manufacture advanced viscoelastic materials for undersea applications. This system will be used to develop the technology to print soft materials that have unique application for naval undersea applications.Additionally, this system will serve as a test-bed for developing the understanding of materials chemistry, processing, manufacture and performance while supporting and advancing the research and educational aims of the faculty and students of the Pennsylvania State University. The faculty, staff, and students of the Penn State University~s College of Engineering, the Applied Research Laboratory (ARL), the Graduate Program in Acoustics, the Center for Acoustics and Vibration (CAV), Penn State Erie, and the Navy~s Center for Undersea Materials Research at Penn State will all benefit from the proposed equipment system.The proposed manufacturing equipment would allow for faculty and students to use advanced manufacturing techniques to design, build, and test complex materials, material systems, and structures that could not be manufactured with traditional methods. The current and past research efforts of ARL and the College of Materials Science and Engineering has led to a firm understanding of elastomeric chemistry and processing. This knowledgebase is the foundation of the methods and models that link the material chemistry and processing to static and dynamic material properties. With this foundation, the ability to generate material systems and components that meet the specific requirements of naval applications in an efficient and controlled using anautomated manufacturing system is desirable. The subsystems of the proposed system consist of the equipment to additively manufacture dynamic material structures: material processors, material blend and fill control, and spatial positioning control of material deposit. The material processors consist of two meter, mix, and dispense systems to control the flow of the neat elastomers. The blend and fill control subsystem changes the composition mixture and fill content. The spatial positioning control subsystem deposits the material at the correct location in space, and has the ability to UV or heat the material. Together these subsystems can create complex, multi-material, filled dynamic and acoustic structures.