TY - JOUR A1 - Zocca, Andrea A1 - Lüchtenborg, Jörg A1 - Mühler, T. A1 - Wilbig, Janka A1 - Mohr, Gunther A1 - Villatte, T. A1 - Léonard, Fabien A1 - Nolze, Gert A1 - Sparenberg, M. A1 - Melcher, J. A1 - Hilgenberg, Kai A1 - Günster, Jens T1 - Enabling the 3D Printing of Metal Components in μ-Gravity N2 - As humanity contemplates manned missions to Mars, strategies need to be developed for the design and operation of hospitable environments to safely work in space for years. The supply of spare parts for repair and replacement of lost equipment will be one key need, but in-space manufacturing remains the only option for a timely supply. With high flexibility in design and the ability to manufacture ready-to-use components directly from a computeraided model, additive manufacturing (AM) technologies appear extremely attractive. For the manufacturing of metal parts, laser-beam melting is the most widely used AM process. However, the handling of metal powders in the absence of gravity is one prerequisite for its successful application in space. A gas flow throughout the powder bed is successfully applied to compensate for missing gravitational forces in microgravity experiments. This so-called gas-flow-assisted powder deposition is based on a porous Building platform acting as a filter for the fixation of metal particles in a gas flow driven by a pressure difference maintained by a vacuum pump. KW - Additive manufacturing KW - µ-gravity KW - Laser beam melting KW - Parabolic flight KW - 3D printing PY - 2019 U6 - http://nbn-resolving.de/urn/resolver.pl?urn:nbn:de:kobv:b43-492190 SP - 1900506 PB - WILEY-VCH Verlag GmbH AN - OPUS4-49219 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -