Challenges in Hydraulic Valve Manufacturing
The traditional hydraulic valve block is a regular rectangular structure. It starts with a metal block, trims the metal block to the desired shape by traditional manufacturing methods, and then drills the internal pipeline for the circulation of hydraulic fluid. It is very difficult to drill these pipes accurately. The pipes need to meet exactly at specific points, but in some "blind" drilling positions, the pipes are not accurately aligned. In addition, drilling a process hole and sealing it at the end creates the potential for components to leak at the process hole location.
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Traditional Hydraulic Valve |
3D printed hydraulic manifold
Manufactured by metal 3D printing technology, the hydraulic manifold eliminates the design constraints of cross-drilling when designing the product, and the sharp corners can be replaced with rounded curved designs to reduce turbulence. The most intuitive impression of the 3D printed hydraulic manifold is that it is no longer a regular valve block, but a set of "pipes" with irregular shapes.
The value of 3D printing technology to redesign hydraulic manifolds is reflected in two aspects. On the one hand, the weight is reduced and the manufacturing materials used are correspondingly reduced. Another aspect is to improve the design freedom, optimize the design of internal fluid channels, and reduce the loss of fluid efficiency.
Hydraulic Manifold Design Optimization
◆Analyze hydraulic manifolds using finite element methods
◆Optimize the layout of structural elements and geometric parameters to maximize ◆the structural stiffness and minimize the mass of the 3D printed hydraulic manifold
◆Use 3D printing technology for hydraulic manifold fabrication and verify the results
◆Traditional hydraulic valve blocks compared to 3D printed manifolds.
3D printed hydraulic manifold optimization process
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Hydraulic valve block vs 3D printed hydraulic manifold
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