ITERI — Metal additive manufacturing using powder sheets

What changes when the powder is in a sheet.

The numbers, against laser powder-bed fusion.

10min

Material change.

Swap the roll and print the next alloy. A powder bed needs hours of clean-down before the next material goes in.

vs LPBF: hours to a day

0kg

Loose powder.

Sheets ship and store as ordinary goods. Metal powder ships as dangerous goods and lives behind a glove box.

vs LPBF: kilograms in the bed

99.65%

Relative density.

Printed SS304, crack-free, in the same density class as laser powder-bed fusion.

vs LPBF: parity

3in 1

Alloys per build.

Stainless steel, IN718 and a high-entropy alloy printed as a single part, fused in the melt pool.

vs LPBF: one alloy per build

Alloy systems to date.

SS304, SS316L, IN718, Ti-6Al-4V and a CoCrFeMnNi high-entropy alloy, all from the same machine.

vs LPBF: one machine, one powder

+65%

Tensile strength from the sheet.

Change the binder content, not the alloy, and the printed part gets stronger. A lever a powder bed does not have.

vs LPBF: no equivalent

Any

Powder shape.

Irregular, water-atomised and recycled powder print at parity with spherical stock.

vs LPBF: spherical, gas-atomised only

Depowdering steps.

Parts come off the plate clean. No sieving, no powder recovery, no requalifying degraded powder.

vs LPBF: sieve, dry, blend, requalify

02 Feedstock

Change feedstock in ten minutes. Change alloy with it.

The feedstock is a roll, not a bed of powder. Swap the roll and the printer is running a different alloy about ten minutes later, with no clean-down and nothing left behind from the last material. That is what makes fast work on high-entropy alloys possible: a new composition is just a new roll, cast in a short run and swapped in like any other.

The IMS-1 printer with its doors open, showing the supply roll, take-up roll and build platform — IMS-1 with the doors open. Supply roll on one side, take-up on the other, the build platform between them. Changing alloy is changing what sits on the roll.

5alloy systems printed to date

+65%tensile strength from one HEA composition, by binder content alone (≈590 to ≈980 MPa)

10 minfrom one composition to the next

Alloys: SS304, SS316L, IN718, Ti-6Al-4V, CoCrFeMnNi, across the group’s publications 2022 to 2025. HEA data: Sasnauskas et al., CIRP Annals 73 (2024).

2.1

Small batches go a long way.

A powder bed has to be filled before you can print a coupon. A sheet carries only the material that goes into the part.

2.2

No clean-down between compositions.

Candidates print back to back on one machine, with nothing left behind from the last one.

2.3

Same machine, new chemistry.

High-entropy alloys and other experimental compositions run on the same printer as the production alloys. Only the roll changes.

03 Multi-material parts

Two or three alloys in one part, from one machine.

Swap the roll mid-build and the next layers are a different alloy. Bi-metallic and tri-metallic parts come off the plate as a single piece, with an interface fused in the melt pool rather than a joint made afterwards.

Electron micrograph of a MAPS build cross-section: high-entropy alloy on Inconel 718 on stainless steel 304, fused to the build plate — **The real thing.**Electron micrograph of the cross-section. High-entropy alloy at the top, IN718 in the middle, SS304 below, sitting on the build plate. One build, no interruption, no joint.

3alloys in one build: SS304, IN718 and a CoCrFeMnNi high-entropy alloy

99.8%density of the tri-metallic composite

Zhang et al., Additive Manufacturing Letters 8 (2024).

3.1

Hard face, tough core.

Put the expensive or wear-resistant alloy only where the part needs it.

3.2

Fused, not joined.

Layer-by-layer transitions made in the melt pool, a few tens of microns wide. No braze, no weld, no adhesive.

3.3

Demonstrated.

Stainless steel, a nickel superalloy and a high-entropy alloy, in one build.

One metal 3D printer to rule them all.