ULTRAFUSE 316L

This high filled filament allows for additive manufacturing of metal parts using the FFF process. It is a mixture of a metal powder (80 % of the filament) and a polymer used as a binder (20 %).

The manufacturing of a complete part comprises three steps:

 

  • In a first step, a so-called „green body“ is printed from Ultrafuse like a common plastic filament.
  • In a second step called debindering the binder material is extracted from the green body so that the part consists nearly completely of metal powder.
  • The last step is sintering: The part is heated in a furnace at a temperature of at least 1,300°C. At the end of the sintering step, during which the part shrinks by up to 20 %, the completed metal part is obtained.

Processing of this filament requires a build area temperature of no less than 100°C in order to ensure basic strength of the part throughout all process steps.