Materials & Design 83 (2015) 768776

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Materials & Design

journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/matdes

Fused deposition modeling with polypropylene

O.S. Carneiro a,, A.F. Silva b, R. Gomes a
a
b

IPC/I3N Institute for Polymers and Composites, Polymer Engineering Department, University of Minho, Campus de Azurm, 4800-058 Guimares, Portugal
CMEMS-UMinho Center of ElectroMechanical Systems, University of Minho, Campus de Azurm, 4800-058 Guimares, Portugal

a r t i c l e

i n f o

Article history:
Received 20 February 2015
Revised 25 April 2015
Accepted 7 June 2015
Available online 20 June 2015
Keywords:
Fused deposition modeling (FDM)
Polypropylene (PP)
Glass reinforced polypropylene (GRPP)
Filament orientation
Layer thickness
Inll degree

a b s t r a c t
This paper addresses the potential of polypropylene (PP) as a candidate for fused deposition modeling
(FDM)-based 3D printing technique. The entire lament production chain is evaluated, starting with
the PP pellets, lament production by extrusion and test samples printing. This strategy enables a true
comparison between parts printed with parts manufactured by compression molding, using the same
grade of raw material. Printed samples were mechanically characterized and the inuence of lament
orientation, layer thickness, inll degree and material was assessed. Regarding the latter, two grades of
PP were evaluated: a glass-ber reinforced and a neat, non-reinforced, one. The results showed the potential of the FDM to compete with conventional techniques, especially for the production of small series of
parts/components; also, it was showed that this technique allows the production of parts with adequate
mechanical performance and, therefore, does not need to be restricted to the production of mockups and
prototypes.
2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Rapid prototyping (RP) represents a new edge on the prototyping process evolution. With the last advances, it is now possible to
build physical models quicker and with more complex geometries,
pushing this type of techniques from printing mockups and
prototypes models towards printing nal products in limited series
[14].
Among the different available rapid prototyping techniques,
including Stereolithography (SLA), Selective Laser Sintering (SLS)
[5] or Laminated Object Manufacturing (LOM) [6], to mention just
a few, the Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) [7] technique is the
trendiest one, although already existed since the 80s. Currently,
FDM is the technique showing the higher potential for product
manufacturing, with the capability to compete with conventional
polymer processing techniques [8].
Though, the range of laments commercially available for FDM
is still somehow limited and costly, which hinders the use of this
technology for manufacturing nal products. Neither the materials
nor the process have been studied in a systematic manner towards
functional components production, with adjusted mechanical
properties, or with the objective of getting competitive production
time/cost (for small/medium production series), respectively
[3,8,9].
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: olgasc@dep.uminho.pt (O.S. Carneiro).
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.matdes.2015.06.053
0264-1275/ 2015 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

The range of applications where this technique can be used is

extensive, ranging from medical applications [10,11] to automotive
[12] and aeronautics [13]. Moreover, the potential to grow is still
on its ascending stage and new materials (metallic- [14] or
wood-based [15], for example) are being constantly delivered to
the market while the printers are getting less expensive every day.
However, the published studies up to now focused little on the
extrusion processing window used in the production of laments
with suitable diameter and homogeneity for FDM. This information
would be essential for the development of new lament materials
for FDM and for the drive of this technique into the production of
nal consumer products. In fact, the optimization of the laments
production could maximize their properties, providing a deeper
control of the process. The use of commercially available laments,
used in the majority of the published studies, limits them to the
inherent characteristics of the FDM process [16].
Moreover, the comparison either at the morphological and
mechanical level of the parts produced by FDM and by conventional techniques would be more authentic if the material used
to produce the parts were to be the same in both processes.
Literature lacks studies that follow the FDM process from the start,
i.e., from the lament production, allowing an absolute control of
the processes and a true comparison between competing techniques [17].
This paper aims to evaluate the FDM technique in its entire
chain, from the lament production to the printing of nal parts,
allowing understanding what are the advantages and limitations

O.S. Carneiro et al. / Materials & Design 83 (2015) 768776

of FDM towards conventional manufacturing processes. In order to

perform such task, two comparisons are performed: at the technique level and at the material level. At the technique level, FDM
is compared to a conventional polymer processing technique,
namely compression molding, the reference technique for the
study. At the material level, commercially available polymer systems, not available for FDM, were selected, which forced their previous extrusion into laments to enable their use both in the FDM
printer (in lament form), and in the compression molding technique (in pellet shape). In this case, a polypropylene homopolymer
(PP), one of the most common plastics used in daily and technical
products, was selected as the material. Two grades of PP were
tested: a glass-ber reinforced (GRPP) and a neat, non-reinforced
(PP). By selecting a commodity polymer, non-conventional for
FDM, it becomes possible to evaluate from the lament production
stage, how one can use conventional polymer systems in a
FDM-based 3D printer, and to compare the performance of the
parts produced with this technique with those produced by a conventional polymer processing technique. Also, by selecting neat
and glass-reinforced grades, the reinforcing effect of bers will
be assessed.
2. Fused Deposition Modeling (FDM) technique
The Fused Deposition Modeling process (Fig. 1) is a RP technology, originally developed by Stratasys, which horizontally deposits
molten thermoplastic material, such as ABS and PLA (the two most
common materials used in FDM), extruded from a nozzle head, fabricating parts layer-by-layer [7,18,19]. A lament is softened and
melted inside the liqueer at a temperature above its melting
point, and is pushed through the nozzle die by the still solid
upstream lament. As the liqueer moves, the extruded polymer
is laid down, starting with the object perimeters and then the lling, for each layer of the object [7,18].
In FDM, over-hanging features may need to be supported by a
structure, whose style can be either break-away or water-soluble
support structures [19]. After part printing, the formers are manually removed by stripping them from the part surface, while the
latter are dissolved in a water/solvent solution that does not interact with the parts structural material. The water-soluble supporting structures, unlike the break-away, can be located in deeply
recessed regions, and can also be in contact with small features,
as they are preserved.
Although the basic principle behind the FDM is quite straightforward, there is a control model supporting the entire system

769

working principle that combines all parameters together, namely

the lament feeding rate, extrusion width, linear plotting speed
and layer thickness. These parameters are tied together as the
speed of an FDM system is dependent on the linear plotting speed
and feeding rate, being the latter also dependent on the rate at
which the liqueer can melt the material and feed it through the
nozzle [20].
Similarly to many other additive manufacturing systems, FDM
starts with a CAD le (generally in .stl format). This le is used to
create the cross-prole (the slices) that will be printed
layer-by-layer. The CAD le only gives the layers outline, being
the software used responsible for dening the inll of each layer
and setting the plot and path of the nozzle [20]. The nal setting
of the print le denes towards which end of the printing spectrum one looks: if towards the geometric resolution (ne prints)
or if towards the mechanical performance.
For a better understanding of the FDM range in terms of print
quality, Fig. 2 illustrates the inuence of the feeding rate and linear
movement speed, for a given layer thickness, on the extrusion
width. An increase in the feeding rate leads to an increase of the
extrusion width, and similar scenario occurs when the linear plotting speed of the extrusion head, or nozzle, is decreased, for a given
feed rate.
If one looks now to the adjacent paths (Fig. 3), there is a range
comprised by the following extreme scenarios: (i) adjacent paths
very close to each other, resulting in an overlap of paths and excess
of deposit lament; and (ii) adjacent paths distant from each other,
resulting in gaps and minimal or non-existing bonding between
them, which weakens the structural integrity of the part. Thus, it
becomes necessary to optimize the width of the path, by extruding
more or less material via changing the feed rate/heads linear plotting speed ratio. Although thicker paths lead to a better bonding
and thus better mechanical performance, it will most probably fail
to meet the geometrical resolution. For the latter purpose, a thin
path will ensure shape accuracy in detriment of the mechanical
properties.
FDM is a technique that presents the advantages of being a
highly-reliable process, currently requiring a low initial investment as well as using relatively low-cost materials. It can be operated in ofce environments, with short built time for parts with
thin walls, low material waste (limited to the supporting structures) and enabling the use of different materials or colors in the
same object or layer. On the downside, the materials it uses must
have low melting temperature, and if the parts require supports
on the overhangs, they will have a poor surface nish and grainy
appearance, requiring time-consuming hand-working procedures
to improve surface aesthetics.
3. Experimental work

Filament

In this section, the materials, equipment and conditions used in

the production and mechanical characterization of the samples is
described in detail.

Filament Pulling
System

3.1. Materials and lament extrusion

Z
Object

X
Y

Fig. 1. Illustration of the FDM technique [based on RepRap].

The materials used in this study were two commercially available polypropylene homopolymer extrusion grades: ISPLEN PP
040 C1E, from Repsol (neat PP) and POLIFOR L6 GF/30
NATURALE, from SOFTER, a PP reinforced with 30%, in weight, of
glass ber (GRPP). Their main characteristics are listed in Table 1.
Polypropylene is used in a variety of application areas such as
textile, packaging, furniture, household appliances, medical
devices, automotive and aeronautics, among others. The
homopolymer variant has a high stiffness and the highest service

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Higher Feeding Rate

or
Lower Plotting
Linear Speed
Nozzle

Nozzle

Layer
Thickness

Extrusion
Width
Fig. 2. FDM extrusion width parameter illustration.

Underfilled Area

Overfilled
Area

Tool
Path
Contour
Path

Fig. 3. Illustration of the paths inuence when seeking to obtain geometric

precision or mechanical performance.
Fig. 4. General view of the prototype extrusion line used in the production of the
laments.

Table 1
Main characteristics of the polypropylene grades used.
Property

Method

PP

GRPP

MFI (g/10 min)

Flexural modulus (MPa)
Vicat softening point (C)
Processing temperature (C)

ISO 1133
ISO 178
ISO 306

3.0
1800
153 (10 N)
190250

2.5
5500
135 (50 N)
190230

temperature among the commodity thermoplastics. It has also a

relatively high shrinkage coefcient, which negatively affects its
dimensional stability. Its main limitation is the low impact resistance at negative temperatures, characteristic that can be overcome by copolymerization (with ethylene). Glass reinforced
grades have better thermal and mechanical properties than neat
PP (as can be seen in Table 1), being often used in the production
of semi-structural components for the automotive and aeronautics
industries.
The two grades were supplied in pellets shape and therefore,
their use in the 3D Printer required the previous production of laments, carried out in a proper extrusion line. The extruder was
equipped with a 2 mm diameter die, especially designed to produce laments of circa 1.75 mm diameter, as required by the printer used in this study. The referred extrusion line is illustrated in
Fig. 4 and the set of their components used in this study is schematized in Fig. 5.
Several extrusion trials, performed in different conditions, were
required to attain the desired circular laments with circa
1.75 mm diameter. The nal extrusion line setup resulted in the
following (see Fig. 5): use of forced air, to cool down the extrudate
in the cooling reservoir, instead of water (to avoid the formation of

Cooling
Reservoir
Extruder

Support
Cylinder

Oven

Pulling Unit
Filament

Fig. 5. General view of the prototype extrusion line used in the production of the
laments.

internal voids in the lament); use of the oven at circa 30 C; and

use of effective pulling promoted by the pulling unit to attain the
required lament diameter. The detailed processing conditions
adopted for the extrusion of the two materials are depicted in
Table 2.

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771

Table 2
Processing conditions used in the lament extrusion of the polypropylene grades
used.
Parameter

PP

GRPP

Extruder/die temperature (C)

Extruder screw speed (rpm)
Pulling rolls speed (m/min)
Oven temperature (C)
Distance die-cooling reservoir (cm)

190-220/220
11
7
30
3

200-230/230
6.3
5
30
4.5

3.2. Production of samples

3.2.1. 3D printer
The 3D printer used in this study was based on an open-source
model known as Prusa i3 (available from RepRap platform [21]).
This is a fully customizable printer that, as any other FDM type
of printers, has as its key elements: the extrusion head, the gantry,
the build surface and the build environment. The full printer is
showed in Fig. 6 and its main features are described next.
Gantry
The XYZ linear movements of the extrusion head and printer
bed are based on a set of lead-drive (Z-axis) and belt mechanisms
(X- and Z-axes) systems, and on four stepper motors. The bed performs only the Y-axis movements while the extrusion head move
on the X and Z-axes.
In order to ensure horizontal leveling of the gantry when performing Z-movements, this system uses two motors, one on each
side of the gantry, that work in parallel to avoid any unbalance
of this structure.
To complete the gantry, a calibration is required before the rst
use to guarantee the leveling of the extrusion head against the
printers bed. This is a crucial step as the levelness of the system
leads to a non-homogeneous stacking of consecutive layers.
Extrusion head
The printers extrusion head is based on the EiNSTeiN Compact
Extruder variant which includes the material feeding mechanism,
extruder and nozzle. Fig. 7 shows an illustration of this system.
The feeding mechanism uses a 50:1 ratio motor to pull the lament from the coil and to push it towards the nozzle, by trapping
the lament between the rotating motor transmission gear and a
bearing.
The nozzle (type J-head nozzle [21]) is a three piece component:
the nozzle itself, the nozzle holder and the liner. The aforementioned nozzle is the site where the lament is melted and one looks
to have this phase transition close to the nozzle die so that the

Filament
spool

Visual
interface
Cooling fan
Controller

Extrusion
head

Heang
Bed

Nozzle

Fig. 6. 3D Printer used in the study.

Fig. 7. Illustration of the extrusion head.

extrudate is pushed out by the upstream yet solid lament. In

order to melt the lament, the nozzle is made of brass and has a
heater and a thermistor connected to it. For this study, a nozzle
with a 0.4 mm die diameter was used.
The nozzle holder is built in polyether ether ketone, PEEK. It
holds the nozzle and performs the interface between the frame
of the extrusion head (made of acrylonitrile butadiene styrene,
ABS) and the nozzle, working also as heat insulator between both
components.
Inside the nozzle holder, one can nd a polytetrauoroethylene,
PTFE, liner that is used to guide the lament to the nozzle head.
This tubing has very low friction coefcient and high working temperature, which ensures the required guiding of the lament
towards the melting site. Also, the tubing enables the nozzle to
work with different lament diameters. In this case, the laments
used had a 1.75 mm diameter.
Build surface
The printing was done on top of a glass plate (20  20 mm) that
underneath has a heating bed (MK2 model), which has an embedded resistor (of circa 1 Ohm). When electric current ows through
the resistor, the energy dissipates as heat, due to the joule effect, to
the printing surface. In combination with the power supply, the
heating bed is able to reach 180 C.
Controller
The electric control of the system is performed via an Arduino
MEGA with a shield to connect with all electrical components
required for the printer. The shield used was a RAMPS 1.4 model
specially designed for this type of 3D printers. At the computer
level, two open-source software were used: a slicer tool (Slic3r)
and a printer control tool (Printrun).
3.2.2. Printing parameters
As there is no information about the printing conditions for
polypropylene homopolymer, PP, and especially for the glass reinforced one, GRPP, several print runs were rst performed to determine the optimal printing conditions with these two materials. A
systematic strategy was pursued, starting with the production of
thin wall (single lament thick) objects in order to determine the
layer thickness, nozzle temperature and the conditions leading to
a good adhesion between the printed part and the heating bed.
During this process, PP showed a high degree of shrinkage during
cooling (due to its semi-crystalline nature), which led to distortion
and decoupling from the printers bed (see Fig. 8).

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In order to obtain adequate printing conditions, tens of printings were performed varying the nozzle temperature, the heating
bed material and temperature, and the linear plotting speed.
Table 3 resumes the optimal conditions for printing with both
materials.
In addition to the above operating conditions, a few details are
worth being highlighted, namely regarding the printing surface of
the bed. PP showed low adhesion to the typical surfaces used in 3D
printer (namely, glass and blue tape). The solution found to
improve the adhesion of the printing object to the bed was to
use a PP plate, ensuring chemical compatibility. However, the plate
needed to be pre-processed by rst scrubbing its surface with a
steel brush and then cleaning it with alcohol. This solution is based
on a similar approach used in thermal welding of PP [22], to provide a strong adhesion between parts. For the case of neat PP,
the difference between the objects printed with non-optimal and
with the optimal conditions described can be clearly seen when
comparing the corresponding objects shown in Figs. 8 and 9.
3.2.3. Experimental plan
With the denition of the optimal printing conditions for each
material, the same object (a tensile test specimen) was printed
for analysis and benchmarking in regard to the mechanical properties. The aforementioned specimens were printed according to the
nominal dimensions from the DIN 53504-S3a standard (Fig. 10).
The same tensile specimen was manufactured via compression
molding to make possible comparing the mechanical performance
of specimens manufactured by both processes.
At the 3D printing process, several specimens were printed with
different inll degrees, deposition orientation and layer thickness.
The inll is one of the key parameters of this FDM process as it
enables the print of pieces with inll lower than 100%, which in

Table 3
Optimal printing conditions for neat polypropylene (PP) and glass reinforced
polypropylene (GRPP).
Process parameter

PP

GRPP

Bed

PP scrubbed
plate
165
Room
temperature
8

PP scrubbed plate or Blue

tape (tesa 56250)
185
Room temperature (PP
Plate)
80 (Blue tape)
8

60

Nozzle temperature (C)

Bed temperature (C)

Linear plotting speed for the

1st layer (mm/s)
Linear plotting speed for the
other layers (mm/s)

Fig. 9. PP sample printed with optimal conditions.

Fig. 10. Nominal dimensions according to the DIN 53504-S3a standard (mm) [11].

practical terms reduces the printing time and saves material. At

the orientation level, one looks to evaluate the inuence of the
deposition orientation on the mechanical properties. With this process, one can choose a given constant orientation for the deposition
or alternate orientation in each layer. The layer thickness is mainly
responsible for the geometrical resolution of the part, and is
directly related to the nozzle diameter. The rule of thumb states
that the layer thickness should be lower than 80% of the nozzle
thickness. Table 4 summarizes the evaluated parameters.
It should be mentioned that for the cases where the inll degree
was lower than 100%, two laments were used, in each layer, to
dene the external contour of the specimens.
In order to evaluate each parameter in a balanced manner, a
standard print condition was set, being, in this study, a testing
specimen in PP with an inll degree of 100%, an alternate orientation of 45 and a layer thickness of 0.20 mm.
The inll degree of 100% was chosen as it is the one that best
mimics the compaction of samples produced by compression
molding. The alternate orientation and layer thickness selected
are typical values for 3D FDM printing with a 0.4 mm nozzle diameter. Overall, nine types of testing specimens of six units each were
printed, according to Table 5.

Table 4
Experimental plan summary.

Fig. 8. PP sample printed with non-optimal conditions.

Parameter

Value

Inll degree (%)

Orientationa ()
Layer thickness, t (mm)

20, 60 and 100

45, 0, 90, crossed 45 (45) and crossed 090
0.20 and 0.35

see Fig. 11.

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773

encompassed the pre-heating of the pellets during 2 min, followed

by a compression stage of 10 min at 10 TON. Cooling was also performed under pressure until the press plates reached a temperature of 80 C. After this stage, the polymer plates were taken
from the mold; (ii) use of a cutter to obtain, from the plates, tensile
test specimens similar to those printed, i.e., with nominal dimensions according to the DIN 53504-S3a standard. This operation
was also carried out in the Moore press, with the plates heated
at 80 C.

(a)

(b)

3.3. Tensile tests

For each sample production condition, six tensile tests were
performed in a universal testing machine, INSTRON 4505, at a
cross-head speed of 50 mm/min and an initial distance of 25 mm
between grips. The tensile modulus and strength were computed.
4. Results and discussion

(c)

In this section, the effect of the printing conditions, the raw

materials and the manufacturing techniques on the mechanical
performance of the samples is assessed.
4.1. Effect of printing orientation

(d)

Fig. 11. Types of orientation used in 3D printing of the tensile test specimens: (a)
45; (b) crossed 45 (45); (c) 0; (d) 90.

Table 5
Conditions used to print the samples.
Material

Orientation ()

Layer thickness (mm)

Inll degree (%)

PP

45
0
90
45
090
45
45
45

0.20
0.20
0.20
0.20
0.20
0.35
0.20
0.20

100
100
100
100
100
100
20
60

45

0.20

100

GRPP

Note: reference printing condition in bold.

3.2.4. Compression molding

The selection of compression molding as the reference process
was mainly due to the simplicity of the process (comparable to that
of 3D printing), to the low degree of anisotropy resulting for the
moldings, which enables a fair comparison between the two techniques, and to the fact that this process is commonly used with
thermoplastic composites, such as GRPP, for the production of
semi-structural components.
The production of the compression molded samples (tensile test
specimens) was carried out in the following sequence: (i) compression molding of 2 mm thickness plates, using a hot plate hydraulic
press Moore (at 230 C) and a plate mold. This operation

For the study of this parameter, the samples printed with different orientations (45, 0, 90, 45 and 090) and constant layer
thickness (0.20 mm) and inll degree (100%), were compared.
Their mechanical properties are shown in Fig. 12, where it can be
seen that the 0 orientation set of samples is the one showing
the best performance. The remaining samples have similar moduli
(if the corresponding standard deviation values are taken into
account) and, in terms of tensile strength, the crossed 45 (45)
samples were the ones with the worst performance.
Having in mind the type of tests performed, the best performance of the 0 orientation printed sample sounds obvious. In fact,
in this case the stress applied is aligned with the deposition direction, minimizing, therefore, problems related with adhesion
between laments belonging to the same layer (due to the lack
of pressure inherent to the 3D printing process). Thus, in this case
the interfaces between neighboring laments are parallel to the
applied force, being not subjected to tensile forces. The similar performance of the remaining samples suggest, however, that the
cohesion between laments of the same layer is relatively good
since even the sample produced with an orientation of 90 performs as well as the others. It should be noted that in this case
the interfaces are subjected to the maximum force during the tensile test since they are perpendicular to the applied load. The most
unexpected result is that obtained for the crossed orientation of
45. In this case, one would expect a similar performance to that
of samples produced with an orientation of 45. The only plausible
explanation for this decrease in performance is a less effective
stacking of the laments of two consecutive layers.
4.2. Effect of the layer thickness
The effect of the layer thickness was assessed comparing samples produced with layer thicknesses of 0.20 and 0.35 mm, maintaining constant the remaining printing parameters. As can be
observed in Fig. 13, the inuence of this parameter is not
remarkable.
The samples produced with the higher thickness layer value
show, however, a slightly higher tensile strength. Most probably,
this is a consequence of the lower number of interfaces between
laments, when compared to that corresponding to the reference

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O.S. Carneiro et al. / Materials & Design 83 (2015) 768776

45

90

0-90

45

45

Filament Orientation

90

0-90

45

Filament Orientation

(a)

(b)

Fig. 12. Tensile properties of polypropylene samples printed with different lament orientations: (a) modulus; (b) strength.

0.2

0.35

0.2

0.35

Layer Thickness (mm)

Layer Thickness (mm)

(a)

(b)

Fig. 13. Tensile properties of polypropylene samples printed with different layer thicknesses: (a) modulus; (b) strength.

ones (produced with 0.20 mm layer thickness), existing in this type

of samples.

potential of the use of ber reinforced materials for the FDM

process.

4.3. Effect of the inll degree

4.4.1. 3D printing versus compression molding

For the reference conditions, the mechanical properties of the
samples produced via 3D printing show a decay of circa 30% in
relation to those produced by compression molding, as shown in
Fig. 16. However, if the best printed samples (produced with 0 orientation) are considered, this decay is lower than 20%. As already
mentioned, we believe that this decay is not promoted by poor
adhesion between the laments but due to the existence of voids
(poor compaction) in the samples.
Finally, it is worth mentioning that the performance of the GRPP
printed samples is similar to that of the neat PP ones produced by
compression molding. This enables to envisage the use of the 3D
printing technique to produce parts with similar properties to those
of PP parts produced by conventional processing techniques if
proper printing conditions and ber reinforced grades are employed.

The inll degree has a strong impact on the mechanical performance of the samples as can be observed in Fig. 14, resulting in differences of more than 250%, in both modulus and strength, when
its value varies from 20% to 100%. Furthermore, the effect is linear:
above a base property value, given by the contour laments that
were used to print this particular set of samples, the variation of
modulus and strength as a function of the inll degree was t by
a linear regression resulting in values of the Pearson correlation
factor of 0.999 and 0.979, respectively.
4.4. PP versus GRPP
In what concerns to the raw materials used, better mechanical
properties were obtained for GRPP (see Fig. 15), that showed
higher values of circa 30% and 40% for the modulus and strength,
respectively, in regard to PP. Therefore, it can be concluded that
the glass bers preserved their role (maintaining a minimum critical length) even after the extrusion stage (for the lament production) and the 3D printing process. This puts in evidence the

4.5. Overall picture

Fig. 17 gives a global picture of the study performed, enabling
the direct comparison of all the samples and a clear idea of the relative importance of each parameter.

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20

60

100

20

60

100

Infill (%)

Infill (%)

(a)

(b)

Fig. 14. Tensile properties of polypropylene samples printed with different inll degrees: (a) modulus; (b) strength.

PP

GRPP

PP

GRPP

(a)

(b)

Fig. 15. Tensile properties of samples printed with PP and GRPP at the same (reference) conditions: (a) modulus; (b) strength.

PP

GRPP

45; 0.2mm

45; 0.2mm

PP
Compression

(a)

GRPP
Compression

PP

GRPP

45; 0.2mm

45; 0.2mm

PP
Compression

GRPP
Compression

(b)

Fig. 16. Tensile properties of polypropylene and glass reinforced polypropylene produced by 3D printing and by compression molding: (a) modulus; (b) strength.

O.S. Carneiro et al. / Materials & Design 83 (2015) 768776

60

3000

Young Modulus (MPa)

mx.

2500

50

2000

40

1500

30

1000

20

500

10
0

Material PP
Orientation () 45
Layer thickness (mm) 0.20
Infill degree (%) 100
Technique FDM

Ultimate Tensile Strength (MPa)

776

PP
0
0.20
100
FDM

PP
90
0.20
100
FDM

PP
45
0.20
100
FDM

PP
0-90
0.20
100
FDM

PP
45
0.35
100
FDM

PP
45
0.20
20
FDM

PP GRPP
45
45
0.20 0.20
60
100
FDM FDM

PP
CM

GRPP
CM

Fig. 17. Tensile properties (modulus and strength) of all the printed (FDM) and compression molded (CM) samples.

5. Conclusions
The approach used in this study enabled the full control over
the complete process, from the extrusion of the laments to the
printing of samples, and a fair comparison (using exactly the same
materials) between competing technologies, avoiding many of the
issues identied in other studies.
The main partial conclusions of this study were the following:
(i) given the results obtained with different printing orientations,
the adhesion between adjacent laments is evident but, as
expected, the samples are stiffer in the lament direction; (ii)
the thickness of the layers has little inuence on the mechanical
performance of the samples; (iii) the inll degree has a dramatic
and linear effect on the mechanical properties; (iv) the use of
bers as reinforcement is also effective in 3D printing; (v) the
loss in the mechanical performance of the printed samples is
circa 2030%, depending on the printing parameters values used,
when compared to that of samples produced by compression
molding; and (vi) the use of enhanced (ber reinforced) grades
enables to cancel the afore-mentioned decay in properties.
As a nal conclusion we believe that there is room to further
improve the performance of the printed samples, making this process competitive when compared to the conventional ones, for the
production of small series of parts/components. FDM has, therefore, the potential to surpass the limitations associated to the
mechanical performance of the produced parts and shall not be
restricted to the production of mockups and prototypes.
Acknowledgements
This work is funded by FEDER funds through the COMPETE
2020 Program and National Funds through FCT - Portuguese
Foundation for Science and Technology under the projects
UID/CTM/50025/213 and UID/EEA/04436/2013.
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