How to Produce 3D Printing Metal Powders
Metal powder manufacturing is a fundamental aspect of powder metallurgy. Different methods used to prepare metal powders include reduction, electrolysis, carbonyl decomposition, grinding, and atomization.
The four most widely used methods for producing metal powders are solid-state reduction, electrolysis, chemical, and atomization.
Most manufacturers use electrolysis and reduction methods to produce elemental metal powders. But they are not suitable for the production of alloy powders. However, the atomization method tends to overcome this limitation, so manufacturers use it for the production of alloy powders.
Electrolysis is another method used to produce powdered metals. By choosing the appropriate electrolyte composition, temperature, concentration and current density, different metals can be deposited as sponges or powders. This can be followed by washing, drying, reduction, Annealed and crushed. This method produces metal powders of very high purity. It is basically used for highly conductive copper powders due to its high energy requirements.
The atomization method refers to the method of pulverizing molten metal into particles with a size of less than 150 μm by mechanical methods. According to the method of pulverizing molten metal, atomization methods include two-stream atomization, centrifugal atomization, ultrasonic atomization, Vacuum atomization, etc. These atomization methods have their own characteristics, and they have been successfully used in industrial production. Among them, the water-gas atomization method has the advantages of simple production equipment and process, low energy consumption, and large batches, and has become the main metal powder. Industrial production methods.
