Assembly Level Topology Optimization Towards a Part Consolidation Algorithm for Additive Manufacturing

As the adoption of additive manufacturing continues to grow in the aerospace industry, part consolidation is an emerging design technique aimed at decreasing assembly cost. Significant research is focused on design for additive manufacturing principles and their integration into design generation tools such as topology optimization, while part consolidation research has been limited to heuristic guidelines. This work presents the extension of topology optimization to assembly design for the simultaneous optimization of structural performance and connection layout. This methodology uses multiple domains occupying the same space along with a single joining domain to represent the assembly design. The proposed approach allows for future extensions with the calculation of additive manufacturing part costs on an individual domain level. The methodology is tested on a numerical example demonstrating the variation in part geometry and number of parts as the emphasis on joining cost is varied.