Effect of Aging on the Mechanical Properties of Methacrylate 3D Printed Parts

The effects of natural and artificial aging processes on the mechanical properties of commercially available methacrylate photopolymer parts are explored in this paper. The specimens were produced with Grey Pro resin on a Formlabs Form 3L stereolithography (SLA) printer. A design of experiments was developed and the specimens were evaluated for: time elapsed since printing (green, 1 and 3 months), storage condition (ambient laboratory environment, darkened container), and aging process (ambient laboratory lighting, manufacturer suggested post-cure). The mechanical properties were characterized using uniaxial quasi-static tensile and microhardness testing to evaluate the experimental design. Additional microhardness maps were generated from cross-sections of bisected cubes to assess depth-of-cure and spatial gradients resulting from the aging process. After evaluation, preliminary results highlight the time, storage, and aging sensitivities of SLA-printed methacrylate photopolymer parts’ mechanical properties in both bulk (tensile) and local (microhardness) measurements.