PROJECT DESCRIPTION - INNOVATION GOAL
General purpose
The overall goal of ViL is to improve the competitiveness of “Additive Manufacturing” (AM) through closed loop control based on visual analysis of the melting zone and its environment. This more efficient control improves the quality of the products made, increases productivity, reduces energy wastage and waste. The ViL system offers the following functionality:
• Analysis of the dynamics of the melting process in the melting zone;
• Detection of abnormal behavior around the melting zone, of the solidification process and of all zones of the product-to-be;
• Control loop for optimizing product quality and reducing waste.

Concrete goals and criteria
ViL will increase the quality and productivity and thus reduce the main disadvantages (lower quality, more waste, higher cost) of AM compared to other metal production processes. The concrete research goals are:
• A (patentable) machine independent off-axis monitoring system with possibilities of both local (melting zone level) and global monitoring with the required resolution: 20 kHz temporal and better than 100 μm spatial.
• Improved X-ray polychromatic discrete reconstruction, with up to 90% less beam hardening artifacts, and more accurate and better identification of pores and cracks.
• Region of interest X-ray tomography using inside information (eg from optical data) for faster and more cost effective inspection.
• Accurate 3D reconstruction and matching techniques to align 3D optical and X-ray images with an accuracy better than the layer thickness of a 3D part (~ 30μm).
• Innovative predictive models of AM defects based on vision and to correlate optical characteristics with physical defects. Translation of detected pores 100μm and splash distribution around melting zone in quality features of the printed part.
• Innovative simulation of print processes to predict print quality as a function of print parameters and current status.
• Innovative control strategies and fast algorithms (2 kHz) to convert the predictive models into control actions for improved product quality.

Expected impact
The Materialize business case is:
• without ViL, the focus of their product "Materialize Inspector" is on monitoring AM for plastics, with ViL also a serious market position on metal inspection
• increasing the market share of the Materialize Control Platform (MCP)
This project offers Esma three advantages:
• the quality of the printed parts is quantified and improved,
• a production run can be stopped earlier if it turns out that the result will not be good (avoid losses and scrap)
• For a new material or product, the correct settings (a few hundred parameters) can be found faster (time savings and productivity).
For Dekimo:
• the ViL platform and the hardware proof-of-concept are subsequently developed and industrialized into a camera module with integrated processing unit. This allows for more applications at an affordable price.
• Dekimo will enter new markets with the realized IP and use the gained market experience for correct pricing.
For AdditiveLab:
• Thanks to Vil, AdditiveLab will expand its current simulation solution offering to in-process simulations, growing the company from a pre-process sole simulation provider. Market trends confirm the need for this. The ongoing simulation research in this project will be refined and licensed to existing and new users.
• ViL will facilitate further research in this field for AdditiveLab which will in turn improve its simulation products, AdditiveLab LITE and AdditiveLab RESEARCH.