Characterization of the Chemical Finishing Process with a Cold Acetone Bath of ABS Parts Fabricated by FFF

Additive Manufacturing (AM) is going through an impressive growth from 15 years to today. Its main strength is the capability to fabricate complex parts for a wide range of applications. In contrast, its typical layer-by-layer building method can cause a low surface finishing of the parts. Post-processes as chemical treatments can be used to enhance the finishing but few studies are published on the topic. This work focuses on the surface prost-treating of ABS parts made by FFF. During the treatment, the part is immersed in a cold acetone bath to chemically dissolve and smooth its surface. The process is characterized by varying the duration of treatment, the orientation of the surface with respect to gravity and using samples covering the full range of initial roughness. The results are statistically analyzed showing the robustness of the process. Moreover, the effectiveness of the treatment is proven by an overall reduction of the roughness which is 97% on average within 1 min of treatment.