Processing of tungsten heavy alloy by extrusion-based additive manufacturing

Tungsten heavy alloy (WHA) is a class of liquid phase sintered composite material that consists of predominantly tungsten (typically 90 wt% or more) grains dispersed in a matrix of two or more elements chosen from Fe, Ni, Co, and Cu. Due to its unique combination of properties including high density, strength, hardness, toughness and good corrosion resistance, these alloys have found numerous applications in diverse industries such as counter weights, sporting goods, kinetic energy penetrators, radiation shields, vibration dampening devices, etc. Bound Metal Deposition (BMD) is an additive manufacturing (AM) technology that has its roots in Powder Injection Molding (PIM) and a freeform material extrusion process of fused filament fabrication (FFF). The process is capable of rapid prototyping and low volume serial production of complex shaped parts. This paper reports on the preliminary investigations in the processing of a WHA composition using the BMD process.