Development of Additive Manufacturing for Landing Gear Components

With the growth of metal additive manufacturing (AM), the technology has reached a readiness level where aerospace suppliers, such as Lockheed, Boeing, General Electric, and Airbus, are investigating AM solutions to solve significant logistic and technical challenges for landing gear parts. It appears feasible in the near future to replace current forging and machining production with metal AM to produce landing gear parts with equal or improved strength, weight, and corrosion resistance. Phase II efforts will focus on the investigation and development of typical landing gear materials including Aluminum-Nickel-Bronze (AlNiBr) and high strength steel (HSS) alloys 300M and 4340. Along with the developmental work on these alloys, investigations into the effectiveness of typical landing gear processing will be completed to ensure AM developed landing gear parts can be sustained effectively. All of this will be targeted to ensure the certification requirements for the materials and parts are met to support implementation and usage when qualified. The major elements of this Phase II effort include high strength AlNiBr development using laser powder bed fusion (LPBF), HSS development using LPBF and electron beam additive manufacturing (EBAM), and the evaluation of landing gear processes on AM parts.