Effect of palm stearin content on the properties of Injection Moulded 316L stainless steel powder

Abstract

The influence of the palm stearin content in composite binder comprising palm stearin (PS) and poly propylene (PP) on moulding, debinding and sintering behaviour of injection moulded samples of 316L stainless steel powder has been investigated. Palm stearin is one of the local main production and has a potential as a binder component in MIM since it consist of fatty acid which acts as a surface active agent for many binder used. It is shown that increase in the PS content allows injection moulding to be carried out at lower temperature, while having the unfavourable consequences of reducing the stiffness and the green and brown strength of the mouldings. The increase of PS content of the binder, resulted increase in the density of green specimen and sintered densities of the mouldings. It was found that increasing the PP content of the binder enhance the rate of removal of the PS during the leaching.