Relationship between particle size and manufacturing processing and sintered characteristics of iron powders

Abstract The effect of particle size distribution on physical properties of powder mixtures, of green compacts and of sintered samples has been studied. In the case of powder mixtures, the evaluated properties were flowability, apparent density, specific surface and compressibility. In green compacts porosity, roughness and green strength were evaluated, and in sintered samples grain size and transverse rupture strength were measured. In order to obtain samples with different average particle size, water atomized iron powders were sieved and separating it with sieves ranging from +44 to -150 m m. Flowability and compressibility decrease as average particle size does. On the opposite side, green strength and transverse rupture strength (TRS) increase as particle size diminishes. These effects were associated with changes in morphology and specific surface of the studied powder mixtures. Mathematical expressions relating average particle size with green strength, roughness and ultimate tensile strength were deduced from the experimental results. The results show that an appropriate selection of average particle size for the preparation of the powder mixture is useful in order to obtain samples with suitable physical properties.