Introduction to Particulate Technology

Dr. Nimu Chand Reger (Assistant Professor)

Metallurgical and Materials Engineering
National Institute of Technology Tiruchirappalli, Tamilnadu
620015
nimu@nitt.edu

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Scope and Objective
The scope of this subjects covers understanding
Syllabus
• Introduction – Historical background, important steps in powder metallurgy (P/M) process - Advantage and
Limitations of powder metallurgy process and Applications Methods – Production of ceramic powders - powder
production techniques.
• Characteristics: sampling – chemical composition, particle shape and size analysis, Surface area, packing and
flow characteristics, Porosity and density, compressibility, Strength properties.

• Blending and mixing of metal powders; Compaction of powders, pressure less and pressure compaction
techniques - single action and double action compaction, Cold Isostatic compaction, powder rolling, continuous
compaction, explosive compaction, Hot temperature compaction – Uni axial hot pressing, Hot extrusion, Spark
sintering, Hot isostatic pressing, Injection moulding – Sintering – Types – Theory of sintering – process
variables, Effects of sintering – Sintering atmospheres – metallographic technique for sintered products.

• Post sintering operations – Sizing, coining, repressing and resintering, impregnation, infiltration, Heat
treatment, steam treatment, machining, joining, plating and other coatings. Products: Porous parts, sintered
carbides, cermets, dispersion strengthened materials, electrical applications, sintered friction materials
Atomisation, Mechanical alloying, Metal Injection moulding, Microwave sintering and self- propagating high
temperature synthesis.
 What is Material Science ??

Fig.1 Shows Materials Science Tetrahedron

Correlation between microstructure and properties can be well defined in Material science
and engineering

Microstructure depends on the processing route while performance is dictated by properties.

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 Materials Science and Engineering (MSE)

Fig.1 Various areas merge with Materials Science & Engineering

Material Science is an interdisciplinary area where many science and

engineering streams merge together
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 Introduction
to Powder/ particulate technology

Fine Powder
Powder Processing

Application parts
The technology of pressing metal powders into a specific shape is not new;
older civilizations practised the art in prehistoric times, as bear witness the
iron pillar in Delhi.

Modern powder metallurgy (P/M) technology commenced in the 1920s

with the production of tungsten carbides and the mass production of
porous bronze bushes for bearings.

During the Second World War, further development took place in the
manufacture of a great variety of ferrous and nonferrous materials,
including many composites and a steady growth period developed during
the postwar years until the early 1960s
Growth of P/M has expanded more rapidly, mainly because of three
potential reasons – economical processing, unique properties and captive
processes.
Physical metallurgy is the science concerned with the physical and mechanical
characteristics of metals and alloys
This field studies the properties of metals and alloys as affected by the
following three variables
a. Chemical composition
The chemical constituents of the alloy
b. Thermal and or heat treatment
the effect of temperature and rate of heating and cooling
c. Mechanical Treatment
Any operation that causes a changes in shape such as rolling, drawing,
stamping, forming and machining
 Powder metallurgy
Powder metallurgy is also one of the mechanical treatment which involves
conversion of metals or alloys into the fine powder and converting them into
desired shape

Metals and alloys can be fabricated into any desired shape by hot working
process, during which the metal remains in the liquid state or in the solid
state.

A new technique called powder metallurgy (PMA) has been has been
developed for fabricating metallic objects from metal powder.
The world wide popularity of powder metallurgy lies in the ability of this technique to
manufacture complicated metal objects to exact dimensions, at very high rates economical
prices and provide technical achievements to improve the quality

Definition
Powder metallurgy (P/M) is the art and science of manufacturing fine metal powders (i.e.,
raw materials) consolidating them and fabricating into desired shape of the articles with
little and no melting

Powders are defined as particles that are usually less than 1000 nm (1 mm) in size. Most of
the metal particles used in PM are in the range of 5 to 200 mm (0.2 to 7.9 mils).

Powders have a high ratio of surface area to volume and this is taken advantage of in the
use of metal powders as catalysts or in various chemical and metallurgical reactions. While
this article focuses on the use of powders to make functional engineering components,
many metal powders are used in their particulate form.
The three main reasons for using PM are economic, uniqueness, and captive applications, as shown in below Fig. 1.

Fig. 1 Three main reasons for choosing powder metallurgy shown in the form of a Venn diagram. The intersection
of the three circles represents an ideal area for applying PM techniques.
For some applications that require high volumes of parts with high precision, cost is the
overarching factor.
A good example of this segment is parts for the automotive industry (where
approximately 70% of ferrous PM structural parts are used).

Powder metallurgy parts are used in engine, transmission, and chassis applications.
Sometimes it is a unique microstructure or property that leads to the use of PM
processing: for example, porous filters, self-lubricating bearings, dispersion
strengthened alloys, functionally graded materials (e.g., titanium-hydroxyapatite), and
cutting tools from tungsten carbide or diamond composites.

Captive applications of PM include materials that are difficult to process by other

techniques, such as refractory metals and reactive metals. Other examples in this
category are special compounds such as molybdenum disilicide and titanium
aluminide, or amorphous metals.
Advantages of Powder Metallurgy

1. Rate of production is high

2. Highly complicated articles can be manufactured
3. It is highly cleaner and quieter operations and longer life
4. Mechanical operations are not required because the object possess
very good dimensional accuracy and good surface finishing
5. Life of the component part is longer
6. Metals as well as non metals can be mixed in any proportion
7. The products produced are relatively more uniform and free from
defects such as voids, blow holes etc.
8. No material is wasted
9. Parts with wide variations in composition and materials can be
produced
10. Skilled labour is not required
11. Antifriction alloy strips can be made by powder metallurgy
technique
12. Porous parts can also be produced
13. Impossible parts like super hard cutting tools can also be produced
14. Porous products can manufactured. Lubricants can be impregnated
into porous bearings and bushings under pressure to obtain
components which are self lubricating for life.
15. Excellent reproducibility and improved physical properties
Disadvantages and limitations
1. It is difficult to secure exceptionally high purity powder with satisfactory
quality and also it is highly expensive to prepare such powders
2. It is unprofitable to manufacture articles in very small quantities because of
the great expense of the suitable tools and equipment's
3. Since the complicated object has to be ejected from the die without
fracture, more complicated shapes can not be produced.
4. Porous products are liable to oxidize at the surface as well as throughout
the whole body due to its porosity
5. Since high pressure is required to compact the powder into desired shape,
only limited article is manufactured
6. The parts obtained by PM possess comparatively poor plastic properties
(plasticity, elongation, etc, which limit their use in many applications
7. High investment is needed in heavy press for making larger parts
Manufacturing Process (or) Various Steps of P/M Process
Powder metallurgy process involves the following steps
1. Preparation of metal/alloy powder
2. Mixing and Blending
3. (compacting) and Briquetting
4. Presintering
5. Sintering
6. Hot pressing
7. Secondary operations
Fig. 2 Basic steps of the Powder Metallurgy Process.
Fig. 3 Simplified flow chart of the basic powder metallurgy process.
The conventional P/M process

Fig. 4 Flow diagram for conventional P/M process.3 (Courtesy of Metal Powder Industries Federation, Princeton, NJ.
P/M Process sequence
 For listening

Any questions
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