The industrial interest in additive manufacturing (AM) techniques is currently increasing for the realization of functional mechanical components. For this reason, the structural simulation of parts or complete structures made using this new manufacturing technique is gaining considerable importance. To realise accurate finite element models for the purpose of predicting the dynamic or static behaviour of the component printed and avoid unexpected failures, it is necessary to be aware of some mechanical and physical properties of the print material. Unfortunately, in the literature, it is very difficult to find all the data necessary to perform static or dynamic simulations of 3D printed parts. In this context, this activity aims to determine all these mechanical and physical properties for parts made in White-Pearl Polylactic-acid (PLA) Ultimaker filament using the Fused Filament Fabrication (FFF) technique. A set of printing parameters was chosen and kept constant in all tests which, based on literature data, maximizes the static strength and the fatigue limit of the component. Only the building direction was varied to increase the applicability of the obtained results to any geometry. The main results found for the horizontally moulded specimens (representing the best constructive solution) are the Ultimate Tensile Strength equal to 57.15 MPa, the elastic modulus 2606 MPa, the fatigue limit evaluated at $$2 \times 10^{6}$$2 × 10 6 cycles equal to 13.5 MPa, the damping and density of the material of 0.008 dimensionless value and 1.1246 g/cm³, respectively. Only thanks to the obtained results, finite element models can be developed for reliable static and dynamic analysis.

Additive manufacturing (AM) is gaining relevance for the freedom it gives to designers in experimenting topologically optimized components, especially those having lattice morphology. Indeed, these are of great interest in various application fields (automotive, biomedical, etc.) because, in addition to a significant mass reduction, lattice topology (micro-scale) can be tuned to provide the final product (macro-scale) with the specific properties it needs to exhibit. However, additive manufactured lattice structures are still to be fully investigated, given the mismatch between the designed and the manufactured final product. This paper presents some preliminary results from a multi-instrument approach, grounding on non-contact measurement techniques, to characterize lattice and trabecular structures in terms of dimensional accuracy, surface morphology, stress-strain distribution and modal behavior.

Non-destructive testing for structural health monitoring is becoming progressively important for gas turbine manufacturers. As several techniques for diagnostics and condition-based maintenance have been developed over the years, the tip-timing approach is one of the preferred approaches for characterizing the dynamic behavior of turbine blades using non-contact probes. This experimental work investigates the uncertainty of the time-of-arrival of a Blade Tip-Timing measurement system, a fundamental requirement for numerical and aeromechanical modeling validation. The study is applied to both the measurement setup and the data processing procedure of a generic commercial measurement system. The influence of electronic components and signal processing on the tip-timing uncertainty is determined under different operating conditions.