Additive Manufacturing Wet Blasting

The numerous benefits of wet blasting (vapor blasting) additive manufactured components...

• Uniform Surface finishing: Wet blasting helps achieve smoother and more uniform finishes on AM components, to beyond the quality achieved by CNC. The process removes imperfections such as build lines, layering artifacts, and rough surfaces, resulting in improved aesthetics and texture. This results in components that are consistently superior in quality to die-case equivalents.
• Damage-free processing: Unlike dry blasting, the cushioning effect of the water in the blast slurry prevents damage to delicate component surfaces.
• Control over surface roughness: Wet blasting allows for precise control over the level of surface roughness (Ra) achieved on AM component surfaces. In fact, wet blasting allows for more control than any other surface finishing process. By adjusting factors such as the type of abrasive material, nozzle size, blasting pressure, and dwell time, manufacturers can tailor the process to meet their precise requirements. Learn more about the controllable factors of wet blasting.
• Enhanced surface cleanliness: Wet blasting effectively removes residual powder, support structures, and contaminants from AM components. This is particularly important for parts produced using powder bed fusion technologies like Selective Laser Sintering (SLS), Selective Laser Melting (SLM) or Direct Metal Laser Sintering (DMLS), as it ensures the removal of excess powder and improves the overall cleanliness of the part.
• Powder removal from channels: Wet blasting is particularly effective at removing un-sintered or partially sintered powder from the complex internal channels that are frequently a feature of AM components. The wet blast slurry even gives a visible indication that the channel is clear when it exists the channel.
• Reduced stress concentration: Wet blasting can help alleviate stress concentration points that may exist in AM parts. The process gently removes material from the surface, smoothing out irregularities and minimising the risk of stress cracks or failures due to localised stress concentrations.
• Improved fatigue performance: The surface treatment provided by wet blasting can enhance the fatigue performance of AM components. It can peen the surface transforming tensile stresses into compressive stresses to help reduce the risk of component failure in known areas of weakness and in so doing extend the life of the part.
• Surface preparation for coating and bonding: Wet blasting can be used as a preparatory step for subsequent post-processing operations such as painting, coating, or bonding. By creating a clean and uniformly textured surface, it enhances the adhesion and quality of subsequent coatings or treatments applied to AM components. The process creates a ‘wet-out’ surface that ensures an even and complete application or adhesives and coatings.
• Surface preparation for sterilisation: Wet blasting can produce a surface on AM components with an optimum Ra surface roughness for sterlisation.
• Coating enhancement: Once an AM component has been coated, wet blasting can be used to ensure the coating is consistent and free from imperfections like coating droplets, to leave a uniform surface.
• Coating performance improvement: The conversion of tensile stresses to compressive stresses by wet blasting, as mentioned above, can be applied to coatings to help improve coating durability.
• Substrate compatibility: Additive manufacturing processes can produce parts from various materials like polymers, metals, composites, and ceramics. Wet blasting is a versatile finishing process that can be tailored to accommodate these different materials, making it suitable for a wide range of AM components.
• Safe and eco friendly: Wet blasting does not use hazardous solvents and because the abrasive media is contained within water, there are none of the dust-related health issues or explosion risks associated with dry blasting. This helps reduce costs too as there is no need for costly chemical disposal or dust filtration. In addition, our machines recirculate water and only filter out spent media making them relatively eco-friendly.