Development of Irregular Gas-Atomized Powder for MIM

Metal Injection Molding (MIM) partsmakers have indicated that the use of alloy metal powders currently available results in unacceptable distortion of large aspect ratio parts. This is attributed to the low "brown" strength of debound parts made with spherical gas atomized powder. This proposal will explore a solution to the problem: the creation of irregular gas atomized powder. It outlines three alternative approaches. The first is the modification of powder shape by milling subsequent to atomization. The second and third approaches are proprietary techniques for producing irregular powder during gas atomization. Irregular powders will be evaluated by injection molding a selected high aspect ratio part, and measuring the distortion following debinding and sintering.