2018 Volume 65 Issue 9 Pages 539-547
Powder injection molding is a combined technique of traditional powder metallurgy and plastic injection molding. Since injection molding step in the process enables to produce complex shapes, powder injection molding technique has high design flexibility and provides a chance to overcome limitations in the current manufacturing process. In this paper, the optimization of powder injection molding process was discussed. The process was roughly divided into 5 steps from solids loading determination to sintering, and the optimization approaches for each step was detailed. Thereafter, the industrial application of powder injection molding process was described with hydrophobic surgical forceps, soft magnet components, PZT array for ultrasound probe and PDP glass components. The process optimization was conducted for each product, and sound products were obtained with the process.
