Online Monitoring Technology of Metal Powder Bed Fusion Processes: A Review

Metal powder bed fusion (PBF) is an advanced metal additive manufacturing (AM) technology. Compared with traditional manufacturing techniques, PBF has a higher degree of design freedom. Currently, although PBF has received extensive attention in fields with high–quality standards such as aerospace and automotive, there are some disadvantages, namely poor process quality and insufficient stability, which make it difficult to apply the technology to the manufacture of critical components. In order to surmount these limitations, it is necessary to monitor the process. Online monitoring technology can detect defects in time and provide certain feedback control, so it can greatly enhance the stability of the process, thereby ensuring its quality of the process. This paper presents the current status of online monitoring technology of the metal PBF process from the aspects of powder recoating monitoring, powder bed inspection, building process monitoring, and melt layer detection. Some of the current limitations and future trends are then highlighted. The combination of these four–part monitoring methods can make the quality of PBF parts highly assured. We unanimously believe that this article can be helpful for future research on PBF process monitoring.