Metal Additive Manufacturing
PSI’s metal additive manufacturing group develops advanced materials and parameter sets to produce flight-weight, high-performance hardware for extreme thermal, mechanical, and aerothermal environments. Utilizing in-house Laser Powder Bed Fusion (LPBF / SLM) systems, our end-to-end capabilities go from fundamental alloy development and functional hardware realization through custom laser scan strategies, powder generation and characterization, and Design for Additive Manufacturing (DfAM) of complex integrated systems
Advanced Process & Alloy Development
We develop tailored print parameters and scan strategies for challenging materials, including refractory alloys, high-entropy alloys (HEAs), nickel superalloys, and high-conductivity copper. When novel compositions require specialized feedstocks, we leverage in-house high-energy ball milling to prepare custom powders for laser powder bed fusion. By combining parameter optimization with advanced DfAM we reliably produce impermeable, leak-tight internal geometries with thin-wall features below 200 µm for demanding aerospace and defense hardware.
Materials Evaluated & Printed Inconel 625 / 718, GRCop-42, ODS GRX-810, NASA HR-2, 800H, AlSi10Mg, Hastelloy X, Invar, 316 SS, Tungsten heavy alloys, Niobium FS-85, custom HEAs
Tungsten Heavy Alloy Parameter Development
Mission-Critical Applications
Our materials and process research directly transitions into defense, aerothermal, and propulsion systems, replacing complex, multi-part assemblies with high-reliability monolithic hardware. By integrating conformal fluid networks, extreme-temperature alloys, and thin-wall structures, we enable flight-ready systems optimized for extreme operational conditions.
Ultra-Compact Heat Exchangers (UCHX) Conformal, thin-wall thermal management systems delivering high power density in space-constrained envelopes and in high-temperature, corrosive environments.
Additively Manufactured Scramjets High-temperature engine bodies and integral cooling flowpaths engineered for hypersonic flight regimes.
Rotating Detonation Engines (RDE) Intricate, regeneratively cooled combustion chambers and injector geometries built to endure continuous high-frequency detonation waves.
GRX-810 component cutaway with integral cooling microchannels