LAUSR

Abstract Generally, metallic alloys adaptive to selective laser melting (SLM) need to meet three basic physical properties, i.e. relatively high laser absorptivity, relatively low thermal conductivity, and especially non-containing low boiling point volatile elements. In this work, high-strength Cu-12.5Zn-2.9Si silicon brass, which does not meet these three requirements, was manufactured by SLM from gas-atomized powder. Interestingly, the SLM-manufactured silicon brass has high relative density (98.8%) thereby exhibiting higher strength than that for cast counterpart. Accordingly, this work substantiates, for the first time, the feasibility by SLM to manufacture high-strength metallic alloys with special physical properties.