Surface Roughness Studies on F357 Aluminum Alloy Fabricated Using Laser Powder Bed Fusion Process

Aluminum alloys processed using laser powder bed fusion are attracting industrial and research efforts striving to achieve the lightweighting potential and combination of good mechanical and corrosion properties. In this study, border parameter optimization for F357 (AlSi7Mg) alloy processed using LPBF was performed with the aim of reducing the as-fabricated surface roughness. The optimization revealed that laser power and scanning speed can significantly influence the surface roughness of cube vertical surfaces. Measured areal average surface roughness (Sa) for cube samples varied from 15 to 24 µm. The cube-based optimized parameters were used to fabricate angled wall samples with angles ranging from 45° to 90°. The surface roughness reduced when the built angle increased from 45° to 75°, while for 75–90°, the surface roughness values remained constant.