Layer thickness influence on impact properties of FDM printed PLA material

Polylactic Acid (PLA) is a widely used material in Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) technology. Additive Manufacturing (AM) parameters are known to have an influence on the mechanical properties of final components. In FDM, the layer thickness is an influencing parameter providing overall better mechanical properties with lower layer thickness values. In that case, the air gaps created between layers and raster lines have a lower share in total volume. However, layer over-compression might be an issue when choosing the lowest layer thickness options. This research paper investigates the impact properties of PLA material with variations in layer thickness namely, 0.1, 0.2, and 0.3 mm are considered here. Charpy tests were used for the impact property assessment, and all specimens were prepared with 100% infill percentage and honeycomb infill structure. Worth mentioning is that specimens have AMed notches. The impact tests were carried out on 7 specimens per batch (a total of 21 specimens). Therefore, obtained impact results from an instrumented pendulum were observed between groups to have an insight into the beneficial influence of lower layer thickness on impact properties and lower result scatter that finer layer resolution should produce.