Fabrication of spherical W–ZrC powder for additive manufacturing by spray granulation combined with plasma spheroidization
Xueni Gao, Zhe Mo, Zhenhua Hao, Rulong Ma, Pei Wang, Yongchun Shu, Jilin He
Abstract
In this study, a W–1%ZrC spherical powder for additive manufacturing was successfully fabricated by spray granulation combined with radio frequency (RF) plasma spheroidization. 3 μm tungsten powder and the nano-sized ZrC powder were spray granulated into a porous agglomerated powder and then spheroidized to form a dense spherical powder by RF plasma. Spherical W–ZrC powder with a narrow particle size distribution and a uniform distribution of Zr element was obtained, whose flowability and apparent density was 7.5 s/50g and 9.36 g/cm3, respectively. Furthermore, ZrC enters the tungsten grains after plasma spheroidization, which causes dislocations in the tungsten grain. The spherical W–ZrC composite powder is expected to suppress the crack formation of W parts during the laser powder bed fusion process.