Steve Sharples

Biography

Steve Sharples Assistant Professor, Faculty of Engineering Download to vCard

Research Interest

Since September 2014 he have been leading a 4 year RCNDE funded project titled "NDE for Additive Manufacture". Currently, the inability to guarantee material properties for any given process is holding back the adoption of AM technologies as industry does not have the confidence that manufactured parts will have the required mechanical properties which are required to meet specific structural needs. Where part certification of a process is required, assurances must be provided that product matches specification. While this is 'easily' achieved in subtractive processes this problem has to date not been solved for additive processes. Critical to enhancing this confidence level in part integrity is in process monitoring. This project will begin to address these problems by integrating non-contact NDE and material characterisation techniques within the AM process. More broadly, it will increase the knowledge about incorporating NDE techniques within manufacturing. Inspection during manufacture potentially provides two key benefits: (1) detection of non-optimal material properties affecting performance (density, cracks, delamination), potentially using this information to instantly rework the areas affected in order to make good; (2) full volume inspection of incredibly complicated structures by inspecting as you make - layer by layer - which would be impossible to do after the fact. It will involve close collaboration between two internationally recognised research groups at Nottingham: the Advanced Optics Group (AOG) will provide expertise on the NDE and characterisation side; the Additive Manufacturing and 3D Printing group - hosts of the Centre of Innovative Manufacturing in AM - provides vital expertise on the AM process.