Research on slicing and path generation method for conformal additive manufacturing of curved multilayer circuits

Conventional additive manufacturing technology adopts the method of plane slice, and the Z-coordinate value for each layer of the slice is constant. When printing curved multilayer circuits, there is an obvious step effect, and it will cause the connection misplacement of different layers of conductive lines, resulting in short circuit or open circuit. Therefore, this paper proposes a slicing and path generation method for curved multilayer circuits. First, the 3D model is sliced by offsetting the substrate surface, and the sliced information of different materials is stored in the corresponding model arrays. Then, the sliced surfaces and boundaries are extracted and the filling method is determined, and the print path is generated with the help of the UG five-axis machining module. Finally, the empty stroke and the operation such as lifting the tools are deleted through code post-processing, and the G code is output. The proposed method is used for the printing of four-layer circuits on a curved substrate. The surface of the printed parts is smooth without ink flow and circuit graphic distortion. The experimental results demonstrate the feasibility of the method.