Effect of ceramic ball inclusion on densification of metal powder compact

The effect of a ceramic ball inclusion on densification behavior of a metal powder compact was investigated under cold isostatic pressing, pressureless sintering and hot isostatic pressing. Several constitutive models in the literature were implemented into a finite element program (ABAQUS) to analyse densification behaviors of metal powder with a ceramic ball inclusion under cold isostatic pressing, pressureless sintering and hot isostatic pressing. Densification and deformation of powder compacts with various sizes of ceramic balls were also studied to investigate the size effect of a ceramic ball inclusion during hot isostatic pressing. Finite element calculations for residual stress distributions were obtained to study the effect of ceramic ball inclusions with different thermal expansion coefficients. Measured density distributions of metal powder compacts were compared with finite element results.