Mixing powders for powder mettalurgy processing: Introducing an alloying element in a homogeneous form

Mixing or blending of powder feedstocks for die pressing of powder metallurgy parts are carried out for introducing alloying element(s) in an uniform manner. Alphie’s production capacity mixers are widely used for such challenging blending requirements.

Die pressing feedstocks generally consist of elemental mixes in order to maintain as high a level of compressibility as possible. Using this approach means that the compressibility is controlled by that of the soft, annealed base powder (most commonly iron). Use of a fully pre-alloyed powder instead would mean that the initial particle hardness and work hardening rate would both be increased by the alloying additions and the compressibility therefore reduced.