The present invention relates to a method for the production of tungsten carbide based hard metal tools or components using the powder injection moulding method.

Hard metals based on tungsten carbide are composites consisting of small (μm-scale) grains of at least one hard phase in a binder phase. These materials always contain the hard phase tungsten car- bide (WC) . In addition, other metal carbides with the general composition (Ti, Nb, Ta, W) C may also be included, as well as metal car- bonitrides, e.g., Ti(C, N) . The binder phase usually consists of cobalt (Co) . Other binder phase compositions may also be used, e.g., combinations of Co, Ni, and Fe, or Ni and Fe.

The handling of the fine metal powders used for the production of cemented carbide and cermets are problematic in two ways. Since fine grained powders have large specific surface areas, they are sensitive to reaction with the oxygen in the air. The metal powder oxidation is an exothermal reaction. Also, the oxidation rate increases with the temperature. This means that the oxidation of fine metal powders is an autoaccelerating process. Due to this, self igniting and dust explosions of the metal powders are a serious risk. Further, it has been reported that the inhalation of most of these metal powders is a serious health risk.

These problems are usually solved with a granulation of these powders with an organic binder. The granulating agent adheres to the surface of the powders and also binds many particles together to a free flowing granulated powder. Since the binder adheres to the metal surfaces, it slows down the oxidation rate of the metal surfaces, and decreases the risk of self ignition and dust explosions. Since the granulating agent binds many particles together, it reduces the risk of air borne dust to be inhaled.

In the production of cemented carbide, metal powders granulated with PEG are usually used, when the slurry processing is performed in a water-ethanol mixture. Industrial production of tungsten carbide based hard metals often includes blending of given proportions of powders of raw materials and additives in the wet state using a milling liquid. This liquid is often an alcohol, e.g., ethanol or water or a mixture thereof. The mixture is then milled into homogeneous slurry. The wet milling operation is made with the purpose of deagglomeration and mixing the raw materials intimately. Individual raw material grains are also disintegrated to some extent. The obtained slurry is then dried and granulated, e.g. by means of a spray dryer. The granu- late thus obtained may then be used in uniaxial pressing of green bodies or for extrusion or injection moulding.

Injection moulding is common in the plastics industry, where material containing thermoplastics or thermosetting polymers are heated and forced into a mould with the desired shape. The method is often referred to as Powder Injection Moulding (PIM) when used in powder technology. The method is preferably used for parts with complex geometry.

In powder injection moulding of tungsten carbide based hard metal parts, four consecutive steps are applied:

1. Mixing of the granulated cemented carbide powder with a binder system. The binder system acts as a carrier for the powder and constitutes 25-60 volume % of the resulting material, often referred to as the feedstock. The exact concentration is dependent on the desired process properties during moulding. The mixing is made with all organic constituents in molten state. The resulting feedstock is obtained as pellets of approximate size 4x4 mm.

2. Injection moulding is performed using the mixed feedstock. The material is heated to 100-240 ⁰ C and then forced into a cavity with the desired shape. The thus obtained part is cooled and then removed from the cavity.

3. Removing the binder from the obtained part. The removal can be obtained by extraction of the parts in a suitable solvent and/or by heating in a furnace with a suitable atmosphere. This step is often referred to as the debinding step. 4. Sintering of the parts. Common sintering procedures for cemented carbides are applied.

The solids loading, φ, of the feedstock is the volumetric amount of hard constituents, compared to the organic constituents, φ can be calculated using the following equation:

A -A where p _s is the density of the cemented carbide as sintered, p _v is the mean density of the organic constituents and p _f is the density of the feedstock, measured with the helium pycnometer.

The viscosity of the feedstock is affected by the viscosity of the organic binder. The organic binder viscosity is close related to the green strength of the material. A low green strength can cause the parts to crack during extraction, where the expansion of the wax during melting causes stresses in the part. Another drawback with a low green strength is that the parts may be damaged during the handling of the parts. A high green strength of the material means a high viscosity of the organic binder.

In the case of having a high viscosity, problems with mould filling, extended mould wear, weld lines, which may open during sin- tering, forming cracks and surface defects as well as mould release problems may occur.

It is an object of the present invention to provide a material with a lower viscosity of the feedstock without sacrificing the green strength.

It has now surprisingly been found that by using metallic binder raw material granulated with a wax, the feedstock shows a significantly lower viscosity during injection moulding without sacrific- ing the green strength.

The method according to the present invention comprises the following steps : 1) Wet milling of the raw materials, i.e. the hard constituents and metallic binder powder, granulated with a nonpolar wax, preferably paraffin wax, in water or alcohol or a combination thereof, preferably 80 wt-% ethanol and 20 wt-% water, together with 0.1- 1.2 wt-%, preferably 0.25-0.55 wt-% carboxylic acid, preferably stearic acid as a granulating agent for the subsequent drying. More carboxylic acid is required the smaller the grain size of the hard constituents.

2) Drying of the slurry formed during the above mentioned wet milling process step.

3) Mixing the dried powder by kneading with a binder system, con- sisting of 30-60 wt-% olefinic polymers and 40-70 wt-% nonpolar waxes. The mixing is performed in a batch mixer or twin screw extruder, heated to 50-200 ⁰ C that forms pellets with a size of approximately 4x4 mm.

4) Injection moulding of the feedstock in a conventional injection moulding machine. The material is heated to 100-240 ⁰ C, preferably 120-140 ⁰ C, and then forced into a cavity with the desired shape. The obtained part is cooled and then removed from the cavity.

5) Debinding the obtained part. The debinding is performed in two steps .

5a) By extraction of the wax in a nonpolar solvent, at 31-70 ⁰ C, preferably at 31-55 ⁰ C. It is within the purview of the skilled artisan to determine by experiments the conditions necessary to avoid the formation of cracks and other defects according to this specification .

5b) By heating in a furnace, preferably in a flowing gaseous me- dium atmosphere at 2 mbar to atmospheric pressure up to 450 ⁰ C. It is within the purview of the skilled artisan to determine by experiments the conditions necessary to avoid the formation of cracks and other defects according to this specification. 6) Presintering of the part in the debinding furnace in vacuum at 900-1250 ⁰ C, preferably at about 1200 ⁰ C.

7) Sintering of the parts using conventional sintering technique.

The invention can be used for all compositions of cemented carbide and all WC grain sizes commonly used as well as for titanium car- bonitride based materials.

Example 1 (Comparative)

A WC-13 wt-% Co submicron cemented carbide powder was made by wet milling 780 g PEG-granulated Co-powder (OMG extra fine, granulated with 2% PEG), 38.66 g Cr3C2 (H C Starck) , 5161 g WC (H C Starck DS80), 20.44 g W metal powder, 16 g Fisher-Tropsch wax (Sasol Hl) and 22 g stearic acid in 1,6 1 milling liquid consisting of etha- nol and water (80:20 by weight) for 40 h. The stearic acid is added in this stage of the process to work as a granule forming agent, when spray drying the slurry. The resulting slurry was spray dried to a granulated powder.

Example 2 (Invention)

A WC-13 wt-% Co submicron cemented carbide powder was made by wet milling 780 g wax-granulated Co-powder (OMG extra fine, granulated with 1,5 % paraffin wax), 38.66 g Cr3C2 (H C Starck), 5161 g WC (H C Starck DS80), 20.44 g W metal powder, 16 g Fisher-Tropsch wax

(Sasol Hl) and 22 g stearic acid in 1,6 1 milling liquid consisting of ethanol and water (80:20 by weight) for 40 h. The stearic acid is added in this stage of the process to work as a granule forming agent, when spray drying the slurry. The resulting slurry was spray dried to a granulated powder.

Example 3 (Comparative)

The powder made in Example 1 was mixed by kneading 2500 g powder from Example 1 with 50.97 g poly (ethylene-co- (alpha-octene) ) with a Mooney viscosity of 16 ml at 121 ⁰ C according to ASTM D-1646 (Engage 8440, Dow Plastics) and 45.87 g Paraffin wax (Sasol Wax) and 5.06 g petroleum jelly (Merkur VARA AB) in a Z-blade kneader mixer (Werner & Pfleiderer LUK 1,0) . This resulted in a feedstock with a density of 8.23 g/ml, corresponding to a φ of 0.553. Example 4 (Comparative)

The powder made in Example 1 was mixed by kneading 2500 g powder from Example 1 with 50.97 g poly (ethylene-co- (alpha-octene) ) with a Mooney viscosity of 10 ml at 121 ⁰ C according to ASTM D-1646 (En- gage 8445, Dow Plastics) and 45.87 g Paraffin wax (Sasol Wax) and 5.06 g petroleum jelly (Merkur VARA AB) in a Z-blade kneader mixer (Werner & Pfleiderer LUK 1,0) . This resulted in a feedstock with a density of 8.23 g/ml, corresponding to a φ of 0.553.

Example 5 (Invention)

The powder made in Example 2 was mixed by kneading 2500 g powder from Example 1 with 51.87 g poly (ethylene-co- (alpha-octene) ) with a Mooney viscosity of 16 ml at 121 ⁰ C according to ASTM D-1646 (Engage 8440, Dow Plastics) and 46.60 g Paraffin wax (Sasol Wax) and 5.14 g petroleum jelly (Merkur VARA AB) in a Z-blade kneader mixer (Werner & Pfleiderer LUK 1,0) . This resulted in a feedstock with a density of 8.23 g/ml, corresponding to a φ of 0.553.

Example 6 (Comparative) The feedstock made in example 3 was fed into an injection moulding machine (Battenfeld HM 60/130/22) . The machine was used for the injection moulding of a Seco Tools Minimaster 10 mm endmill green body. The injection pressure was 39,8 MPa at an injection speed of 15 ml/s. The green bodies had enough green strength for handling without being damaged.

Example 7 (Comparative)

The feedstock made in example 4 was fed into an injection moulding machine (Battenfeld HM 60/130/22) . The machine was used for the injection moulding of a Seco Tools Minimaster 10 mm endmill green body. The injection pressure was 35,1 MPa at an injection speed of 15 ml/s. The green bodies had to be handled with care not to be damaged.

Example 8 (Invention)

The feedstock made in example 5 was fed into an injection moulding machine (Battenfeld HM 60/130/22) . The machine was used for the injection moulding of a Seco Tools Minimaster 10 mm endmill green body. The injection pressure was 34,8 MPa at an injection speed of 15 ml/s. The green bodies had enough green strength for handling without being damaged.

Example 9 The parts from example 6, example 7 and example 8 were debound by extraction in carbon dioxide at supercritical physical conditions, i.e. at 35 MPa and 58 ⁰ C for 20 hours. After the extraction the parts were inspected. The parts from example 6 and 8 showed no surface cracks or other defects. The parts from example 7 showed small cracks visible with an optical microscope at 50 x magnification .