A Review of Laminated Object Manufacturing (LOM) Aspects and Various Processes used in It

Abstract

The purpose of this review is to present a break-through technology named Laminated Object Manufacturing (LOM), which can produce a real three-dimensional object directly from a CAD model in a matter of hours. The present paper discusses the rationale for this technology describes the LOM process and presents an overview of LOM machines currently available on the market. Software interfaces and the use of various materials are discussed as well. The laminated object manufacturing LOM process is an effective rapid prototyping technology with a variety of application possibilities. Applying LOM in rapid tooling and patternmaking is especially advantageous because of the LOM objects, robustness, their wood-like properties, and their comparably low material costs. This review paper presents an extension of the sheet lamination object manufacturing process by using a robotic cell to perform the sheet manipulation and handling as well as proposes a frozen slurry-based laminated object manufacturing (FS-LOM) for processing porous ceramics.