Cold Compaction of Copper Powders Under Mechanical Vibration and Uniaxial Compression

Physical experiments were carried out to study the cold compaction of copper powders under uniaxial compression using our self-designed equipment. Two kinds of copper powders with different particle sizes and distributions were considered. One-dimensional vibrations were utilized before compaction to systematically study the effect of parameters such as vibration frequency omega, amplitude A, and vibration intensity D" on the initial packing density. The macro-property and corresponding microstructures of compacts obtained from initial packings with and without vibrations were compared and analyzed. The results show that higher packing density can be obtained in the compaction of coarse powders with broad size distribution when other experimental conditions are fixed. For each powder, the evolution of packing density vs pressure takes on exponential correlation with high R (2) value. Much denser and more uniform compacts can be realized with the aid of vibration which can improve the particle rearrangement and result in the filling of macro pores formed in initial packing, and the characterization on the microstructure identifies that the particles inside the compact become polyhedrons with regular shape and uniformly distributed. (C) The Minerals, Metals & Materials Society and ASM International 2013