Sintered foams from precipitation hardened stainless steel powder

Abstract

Precipitation hardened stainless steel foam is produced using small prealloyed precipitation hardened stainless steel powder with a water soluble pore former of nearly 100-fold larger size. Structural foams with porosities from 40 to 60 vol.% resulted from extraction of the pore former before high temperature sintering. The pore former particle size and leaching parameters are investigated with respect to the resulting structure. The final porosity is directly related to the added fraction of pore former, providing a direct means to control the properties of the sintered structure, even though the pore former is extracted before sintering.