Effects of orifice shape in contour crafting of ceramic materials

This paper presents the experimentation and modeling efforts at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles, to study the material flow patterns in the extrusion and deposition stages of the Contour Crafting (CC) process. A preliminary finite element analysis (FEA) was conducted for extrusion and deposition mechanisms of CC with ceramic materials (e.g. clay) as the fabrication material. Using the FEA simulations, certain basic understandings of the effect of extrusion orifice geometry on the performance of CC were derived. A square orifice was found to be aptly suited, both in terms of delivering excellent fusion between layers as well as creating the desired external surface profile. The experimental observations support these results.