R. S. Mishra & H. Z. Yu

Additive manufacturing has captured the imagination of the research community and industries across various engineering disciplines because of the unprecedented design flexibility. The last 20 years have seen unprecedented growth in the number of process variants. It has also changed the manufacturing paradigm. For example, if we reflect on the 20th century, we see the push for “economy of scale.” The steel mills became bigger and bigger! High volume production in the integrated mills led to cost-effective availability of metals and alloys. Additive manufacturing has changed this to “print at the place of need.” The manufacturing is now distributed, and it has upended the conventional supply-chain. In the post-pandemic world, it also brings a possibility of developing a resilient supply chain. The solid-state additive manufacturing processes are the best way to replace large size castings and forgings. Friction stir additive deposition and friction stir additive manufacturing are two variants that have evolved from friction stir welding and processing. These processes result in very high deposition rates with wrought microstructure. The structural properties are generally far superior as compared to other additive manufacturing processes. This special topic covers recent advancements in science and technology of these relatively new processes. New applications such as recycling of metallic materials, gradient structures, and heterogeneous microstructures are also enabled by these processes.

JOM, 2023-09-11, Volume 75, Issue 10, Pages 4182-4184, Springer Link, ISSN 1543-1851

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11837-023-06138-1
DOI 10.1007/s11837-023-06138-1