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The tungsten (W)-plated diamond process was explored and optimized. A dense and uniform tungsten coating with a thickness of 900 nm was successfully prepared by the powder covering sintering method. The Diamond-WC-Cu composite with high density and high thermal conductivity were successfully prepared by cyclic vacuum pressure infiltration. The microstructure and composition of the W-plated diamond particles were analyzed. The effect of tungsten coating on the microstructure and thermal conductivity of the Diamond-WC-Cu composite was investigated. After calculation, the interface thermal resistance of the composite forming the tungsten carbide transition layer is 2.11 × 10−8 m2∙K∙W−1. The thermal conductivity average value of the Diamond-WC-Cu composite with a diamond volume fraction of 60% reaches 874 W∙m−1∙K−1, which is close to the theoretical prediction value of Hasselman-Johnson (H-J) model and differential effective medium (DEM) model. Moreover, the Maxwell-Eucken (M-E) model, H-J model, and DEM model were used to evaluate the thermal conductivity of the Diamond-WC-Cu composite.

The composite of low alloy steel reinforced with TiC particles (36 wt%) was prepared by the powder metallurgy (PM) process in this paper. The effects of the chromium content and the total carbon content on the composites were studied. The scanning electron microscopy (SEM) was used to observe the microstructure and such properties as porosity, hardness, transverse rupture strength (TRS) and fracture morphology of the samples were tested. The results show that the optimum sintering temperature decreases with the increase of chromium content. The porosity of sintered samples decreases with increasing the total carbon content, and increases with increasing the chromium content. The TRS and hardness of samples increase with the increase of the carbon content. With the increase of the chromium content, the TRS of the sample gradually decreases, and the hardness firstly increases and then decreases a little. This results from the combined effects of the martensite amount and the shape, size and composition of precipitated chromium carbides in the steel matrix.

The composite of 35CrMo high-strength steel matrix reinforced with TiC reinforcement (50 wt.%) has been produced by conventional powder metallurgy (PM). The sintering temperature and process for heating treatment were discussed. The scanning electron microscopy (SEM) revealed the morphology and distribution of the reinforcement phase. Density, hardness, and transverse rupture strength (TRS) of the samples were analyzed. The results showed that the optimal sintering process for the composite is sintering at 1430 °C for 1 h and heat treatment process is annealing at 850 °C/30 min, quenching at 880 °C/30 min and then tempering at 560 °C/60 min. The composite after heat treatment has excellent mechanical properties with a relative density of 99.7%, hardness of 65 HRC, TRS of 1850 ± 20 MPa, respectively, and will be used as refractory moulds, cold work moulds and some gaskets, etc.

In the paper, the TiC −50 wt.% high manganese steel cermet was made with different sintering processes including vacuum sintering, hot pressing, microwave sintering and spark plasma sintering (SPS). The microstructure, porosity and fracture morphology of the samples were analyzed with scanning electron microscopy (SEM). Phase analysis was carried out using X-ray diffraction (XRD). The density, hardness, transverse rupture strength (TRS) and wear resistance were investigated for the effect of the sintering processes. The results showed that the core–shell structure was not clearly observed for the TiC particles in microstructures and the high manganese steel matrix is BCC structure. Hot pressing, microwave sintering and SPS are useful processes for densification of the cermet. Nearly full density and higher hardness can be reached by these three processes at a lower sintering temperature and in a shorter sintering time. However, higher TRS can be reached by means of alloying completely in a longer sintering time, for example vacuum sintering. Pre-sintering in a long sintering time at a lower sintering temperature is also useful for improving the TRS. Finally, vacuum sintering is an effective process for producing this composite with the lowest cost in the mass production.

The powder–binder separation is a common difficulty during injection molding, which leads to the inhomogeneity in the debinding and sintering stages. Previous studies focus on the relationship between “final results” and “initial conditions”, while the dynamic filling process of feedstock and the evolution of powder–binder separation were ignored. This work investigated the effects of filling patterns on the powder–binder separation during powder injection molding. The mold filling model of PIM has been developed, based on the multiphase fluid theory and the viscosity model of feedstock. Parameters of the viscosity model were modified by the experimental data. Numerical simulations were compared with experiments with the same process parameters. The powder–binder separation phenomena in green bodies were detected by X-Ray computed tomography (CT). The experimental phenomena were explained clearly by the evolution of powder–binder separation obtained with numerical simulation method. A typical compacting filling pattern of PIM and filling mobility variable of the feedstock were proposed. A proper filling pattern was helpful to ensure the mobility of feedstock and the homogeneity of green body.

In this study, diamond-copper composites were prepared with ZrC/Zr-coated diamond powders by spark plasma sintering. The magnetron sputtering technique was employed to coat the diamond particles with a zirconium layer. After heat treatment, most of the zirconium reacted with the surface of diamond and was transformed into zirconium carbide. The remaining zirconium on the zirconium carbide surface formed the outer layer. Owing to the method used to produce the ZrC/Zr-coated diamond in this study, the maximum thermal conductivity (TC) of 609 W&middot, m&minus, 1&middot, K&minus, 1 was obtained for 60 vol. % diamond-copper composites and the corresponding coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) reached as low as 6.75 &times, 10&minus, 6 K&minus, 1. The bending strength of 40 vol. % ZrC/Zr-coated diamond-copper composites reached 255.95 MPa. The thermal and mechanical properties of ZrC/Zr-coated diamond-copper composites were substantially superior to those of uncoated diamond particles. Excellent properties can be attributed to the strengthening of the interfacial combination and the decrease in the interfacial thermal resistance due to the improvement associated with the ZrC/Zr coating. Theoretical analysis was also proposed to compare the thermal conductivities and CTE of diamond-copper composites fabricated with these two kinds of diamond powders.

Selective laser sintering (SLS) technique is capable of rapidly fabricating customized implants with porous structure. A simple encapsulation process was developed to coat 316L stainless steel (316L SS) powder with ethylene-vinyl acetate copolymer (EVA). Subsequently, porous 316L SS was prepared by SLS preforming of EVA-coated metal powders, debinding and sintering in hydrogen atmosphere. The effects of processing parameters on pore characteristics and mechanical properties were analyzed. The results indicate that the porosity of green body mainly depends on laser energy density, while the pore features and mechanical properties of sintered specimens are largely dominated by sintering temperature. After sintering at 1100–1300 °C, the average pore size and porosity are 160–35 μm and 58–28%, respectively. In addition, the elastic modulus and compressive yield strength are 1.58–6.64 GPa and 15.5–52.8 MPa, respectively. It is revealed that the pore structural parameters and mechanical properties of the as-sintered porous 316L SS can be controlled readily to match with those of cancellous bone by modification of SLS processing parameters and subsequent sintering temperature.

The structural and electrochemical properties of a selective laser sintered porous Ti–10Mo alloy were investigated. As the sintering temperature increases from 1100 to 1400 °C, the porosity and pore size decrease from 63% to 28% and from 178 to 56 μm, respectively. The alloy comprises major α and minor β phases at room temperature. With the decrease of porosity, the corrosion potential shifts towards positive direction and corrosion current density reduces, while the passive current density decreases and passivation range widens. The lower porosity, smaller pore size and slightly increased β phase fraction cause a superior corrosion resistance.

Diamond–Cu composites from the direct combination of diamond and Cu show low thermal conductivities due to weak interface and high thermal resistance as a result of chemical incompatibility. In this paper, a new method is proposed to strengthen interfacial binding between diamond and Cu by coating strong carbide-forming elements, e.g., Ti or Cr on the surface of the diamond through vacuum micro-deposition. Interfacial thermal resistance of diamond–Cu composites is greatly decreased when diamond particles are coated by a Cr or Ti layer of a certain thickness before combining with Cu. Thermal conductivity is also increased several times. Cr coating can reduce more effectively interface thermal resistance between diamond and Cu than Ti coating. Moreover, it has a smaller negative impact on the thermal conductivity of the Cu matrix, resulting in higher thermal conductivity of Cr-coated diamond–Cu composites. Through the vacuum micro-deposition technology, Cr on the diamond particle surface is present in the form Cr7C3 near diamond and a pure Cr outer layer at 2:1. The optimum thickness is within 0.6–0.9 μm; at this depth, the thermal conductivities of 70 vol% diamond–Cu composites can be increased four times and reach as high as 657 W/m K. In this work, an original theoretical model is proposed to estimate the thermal conductivities of composite materials with an interlayer of a certain thickness. The predicted values from this model are in good agreement with the experimental values.

A high Nb containing TiAl alloy from pre-alloyed powder of Ti–45Al–8.5Nb–0.2B–0.2W–0.1Y was processed by spark plasma sintering (SPS). The effects of sintering temperature on the microstructure and mechanical properties were studied. The optimized conditions yield high densities and uniform microstructure. Specimens sintered at 1100 °C are characterized by fine duplex microstructure, leading to superior room temperature mechanical properties with a tensile strength of 1024 MPa and an elongation of 1.16%. Specimens sintered at 1200 °C are of fully lamellar microstructure with a tensile strength of 964 MPa and an elongation of 0.88%. The main fracture mode in the duplex microstructure was transgranular in the equiaxed γ grains and interlamellar in the lamellar colonies. For the fully lamellar structure, the fracture mode was dominated by interlamellar, translamellar and stepwise failure.

The process of preparing nickel base superalloy GH4049 from atomized prealloyed powder is studied. The results show that the compacts with relative density over 99% can be made by sintering at 1350 °C for 2 h in vacuum. Sintering in vacuum is better than that in argon atmosphere. The sintering way is supersolidus liquid phase sintering. The tensile strength and yield strength and ductility are about 1113 MPa and 760 MPa and 13% respectively. They are near the wrought superalloy GH4049. There are two kinds of γ′ phase precipitated in the grains. The rectangular γ′ phase is about 200 nm and the global γ′ phase is about 40 nm. The average grain size is below 80 μm. Its property of the compression stress relaxation at 850 °C is better than wrought cobalt base superalloy GH605 (L-605). The results lay the foundation of near-net-shape forming for the powder nickel superalloy GH4049.