Production capacities for specialized metal powders are increasing worldwide. Advances in production technologies generate a demand for tailored and tightly controlled powders with distinctive proper ties in terms of chemical composition, particle size distribution, and particle morphology , as these greatly influence the subsequent processing.
This applies to conventional powder metallurgy processes (mixing-compacting-sintering) as well as to more advanced techniques like metal injection molding (MIM) or additive manufacturing (AM). For MIM, metal powder is mixed with a binder and injected into a mold, followed by thermal or chemical removal of the binder and ? nal sintering (Fig. 1). A rapidly growing technology for the production of metal par ts is additive manufacturing. The term comprises different techniques like selective laser sintering, selective laser melting, or electron beam melting. In all these processes, the product is built layer-by-layer. Each layer is sintered from a smooth sur face of metal powder by a laser beam, followed by adding a new layer of powder.
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