Engineering Manufacturing Process 1 BBCFE

Engineering Manufacturing
Process1
64703 IB- (V)
Powder Metallurgy
Too may people seem to think that the only parts made by powder metallurgy
are the tips for cemented –carbide cutting tools. That this is not so can be
shown by considering some of the components and materials made from
powders.

Electrical relay contact points have dual requirements they must stand up to
the electrical erosion which occurs through sparkling when they open and
close, and at the same time they must be good conductors but will not
withstand the arcing, and tungsten, which has a long life under these
conditions, is not a good conductor. By marking the points from a mixture of
powdered copper and Tungsten both properties are achieved in a material
which could not be produced as a cast alloy.

After the first world war, the porous bearing was made by compacting a mass
of metal powder in such a way that it remains porous. The pours were filled
with oil under pressure and the oil was drawn to the surface by capillary
attraction when the bearing was in use. Later the bearings were made to
incorporate graphite. Controlled porosity has also enabled fine filters to be
made by these methods.

Heavy metals can be made by sintering. A material made by compacting a

binder of 90% tungsten, 5% cosalt and 5% nickel has a relative desnity of it,
compared with lead which has a relative density of 11.3. Such a material is
used for storing radioactive isotopes in relatively thin-walled containers.

General motors used the technique for manufacturing involute gears for gear-
type oil pumps and an interesting comparison has been made between the
processes and manufacture by conventional methods by powder metallurgy
which shows that 30 man hours were required per 1000 gears by
conventional methods while powder metallurgy requires only 15 man hours
per 1000 gears and gave a stronger gear.

Other parts made by powder metallurgy included diamond – impregnated

grinding wheel and drill heads, magnets etc. Most people think that only
cemented carbide, tool bits were made by sintering, but as we can see from
above this is not the case. These tools were of course an important
development in metal cutting and would not have been possible without
powder. Metallurgy but they are by no means the only parts made in this
way.
The applications of powder metallurgy can be generally stated as follows.

© Banff and Buchan College of FE 1 Date of Production/Revision 8/23/2010

Author Code (TMCWP) File :n:\GW\Eng-CW\64703-b.doc
Engineering Manufacturing Process 1 BBCFE

1 To produce solid pieces from material which cannot be melted in

commercially – available furnaces, eg sparking plug insulators.

2 To produce components incorporating time properties of different

materials which, because of their physical characteristics cannot be
readily combined.

3 To make precision parts which are so hard that they cannot readily be
shaped by conventional processes, eg cemented carbide tool tips.

4 To reduce parts with characteristics which cannot be obtained by

conventional methods, eg porous and graphite – impregnated bearings
and fine filters.

5 To produce precision parts and virtually eliminate machining.

In all cases, the method of manufacture of parts by powder metallurgy is

as follows;

a Production of powders
b Compacting into a briquette
c Sintering, the application of heat to produce the required bonding and
hardening.

Production of Powder:- The powder required may be produced by

mechanical, physical or chemical methods.

Mechanical Methhods:- Powders are ground and crushed by impact

pressure to the size required. The modern method of producing the powders
is by “Ball Mill” which consists of a drum about one-third full of hardened steel
balls. The material to be milled is poured into the mill. Which is rotated at
80 – 100 RPM. After the required time the entire contents of the mill are
transferred to a course sieve to separate the balls from the powder which is
then graded by passing through a toner of sieves.

Another mechanical method of powder production is “shooting”. This is

frequently used for making powders from alloys of low melting points such as
aluminium and zinc. The materials are melted and allowed to fall through a
screen, the height of the tower; the metal may be collected under water.
Finer particals are provided by atomising, in which, instead of falling freely,
the moulted metal is dropped in front of a stream of air which blows it along a
tunnel in time form of fine particals. This process give much closer control
over partical size than shotting does.

The different between physical and chemical methods of powder production

is slight. Probably the only purely “physical method” is that of electro-
deposition. Unlike in electro-plating, the deposit is deliberately made of
spongy nature so that it can be removed from the anode
© Banff and Buchan College of FE 2 Date of Production/Revision 8/23/2010
Author Code (TMCWP) File :n:\GW\Eng-CW\64703-b.doc
Engineering Manufacturing Process 1 BBCFE

© Banff and Buchan College of FE 3 Date of Production/Revision 8/23/2010

Author Code (TMCWP) File :n:\GW\Eng-CW\64703-b.doc