Hydraulic manifold design via additive manufacturing optimized with CFD and fluid-structure interaction simulations

Purpose: The purpose of this study is to investigate the feasibility of using additive manufacturing (AM) technique to produce an efficient valve manifold for hydraulic actuator by redesigning valve blocks produced by conventional methods. Design/methodology/approach: A priori, a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) analysis was carried out using the software ANSYS Fluent to determine the optimal flow path that results in least pressure drop, highest average velocity and least energy losses. Fluid–structure interaction (FSI) simulations, processed with imported pressure distribution from the CFD, were conducted to determine the resulting loading and deformations of the manifold assembly. Findings: The new design offers a 23 per cent reduction of oil volume in the circuit, while weighing 84 per cent less. When using the new design, a decrease of pressure drop by nearly 25 per cent and an increase in the average velocity by 2.5 per cent is achieved. A good agreement, within 16 per cent, is found in terms of the pressure drop between the experiment and computational model. Originality/value: It is possible to build an efficient hydraulic manifold design by iterative refinement for adequate production via selective laser melting (SLM) and minimize used material to circumventing building support structures in non-machinable features of the manifold.