Applicability of different powder and polymer recipes in a new design powder injection molding system

Abstract

Production methods are changing day by day with the developing technology. Based on this idea, a new production logic and machine have been developed owing to polymer-supported powder injection molding (PIM). The ability of this newly designed machine (newPIM) to mold metal or ceramic powders supported by polymer binders is discussed in this study. By taking advantage of the polymer properties such as fluidity and sticking, powders are molded with a specially developed machine with high gas pressure in certain sizes. In this study, in which many parameters are processed from feedstock (FS) production to molding; metals Mg/316L and ceramics SiC/SiO2 powders have been used in different powder sizes and structures. In the newPIM process, polymers were included in four different recipes. Paraffin wax (PW), polyethylene glycol (PEG), polypropylene (PP), ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA), poly-methyl methacrylate (PMMA) and low-density polyethylene (LDPE) have been employed in the FS with different combinations. From FS production to the molding stage; pressure, microstructure examination, weight loss, and density change features were investigated. The result indicated that the best FS and molding was obtained by the PEG+PMMA polymer composition formed with a spherical powder with a diameter below 40 mu m. The compression force of the FS in this composition was observed at approximately 3.4k N values.