Design, manufacture and tensile properties of stochastic porous metallic structures

An original methodology was proposed to design, manufacture and test stochastic porous open-cell structures for medical applications. The first phase of the design procedure consisted in the numerical determination of the minimum representative size of the porous gauge section of testing specimens. Next, porosity gradients between the porous gauge section and the fully dense grip extremities of the specimens were created. The tensile specimens with porosities of 0.30, 0.40 and 0.50 were then produced using cobalt-chromium alloy powders and the Selective Laser Melting (SLM) technology. Finally, the specimens were subjected to uniaxial tension to failure to allow the determination of their stiffness and mechanical strength. The elastic response of these specimens in the central gauge section and the porosity gradient zones were in line with our numerical predictions and the literature data.