The mold heat treatment industry in China

After 30 years of development, our country Guangdong area is finally formed today's complete market economy oriented pattern of specialized production heat treatment. Of course, now the Guangdong heat treatment industry in addition to produce mold and its accessories, also produce a large number of mechanical parts, hardware accessories, etc. But the mold heat treatment is still the main products of the industry, now still occupies more than 60% market share. At present, Guangdong heat treatment industry group has about 600 factories, most factories has mold processing business.

In mid and late 1980’s, the endeavor to reform and opening up of market economy are springing up in Guangdong area. Household electrical appliances, light industry machinery, metal products, furniture, and aluminum and stainless steel material manufacturing developed rapidly. Especially the Pearl R0iver Delta region, as the pioneer of reform and opening up, the market consciousness, exploring spirit, reform, and economic development and capital accumulation are changing with each passing day.

Due to the drive force of rapid development of the manufacturing industry chain, a considerable scale heat treatment
industry group was born at the right moment in Guangdong where is almost blank in before. And experienced social
production, mass production and until the specialized production process. While the start of Guangdong heat treatment industry, has connected with the development of die and mould industry. According to introducing, due to the manufacturing industry fast development, the mould demand is very big, thus different sizes of mould processing plants in the Pearl River Delta region dotted with soon.

But heat treatment as a key processing in mold manufacturing chain, in the 80's almost could not be found in the Pearl River Delta region, guangdong has no professional heat treatment factory. Large number of molds had to be sent to Guangzhou large enterprises and institutions of higher learning and scientific research institutes affiliated internal heat treatment factory for heat treatment. But doing so often have the "far water does not put out near fire" feeling, to the entrepreneurs who see "time is money, efficiency is life" at the forefront of reform and opening-up, there is no other better ways. It is in this background, firstly in the Pearl River Delta region began to initiate some private heat treatment factories engaged in the mold heat treatment. In these private heat treatment factories, some attached to the mold factory, some are professional factories providing services to featured products. Nanhai district, Foshan city, such as large-scale aluminum manufacturing industry "raises" a lot of heat treatment factories specialized production of aluminum extrusion die. Demand for MIM mould are also moving in Shenzhen area promoted Shenzhen mold industry and the development of heat treatment industry. 

Brake pad materials mainly experience metal, alloy and powder metallurgy etc.

With increasing car ownership in our country, the production of brake pad is also increasing year by year. Brake pads is the key components of train brake system. The quality of the high-speed rail brake pads is directly related to the train speed can slow down and stop in time, called "the patron saint of life".

With the rapid development of high-speed railway in China, its various performance requirements also corresponding increase, especially puts forward more strict requirements on braking performance. The braking power and speed of the train is cubic relationship, that is to say, the train speed double then braking power requires increased 8 times. High-speed train braking force mainly include electric braking force and friction, the friction braking is train safe parking final guarantee. Friction braking force comes from the friction between the brake disc and brake pads on the braking system. And in the braking system brake pads performance has very big affect on the train braking effect. Brake pad materials at home and abroad mainly experience metal, alloy and powder metallurgy etc.
In the world there is only a few countries such as Germany, France and Japan can produce high-speed train brake pad. Among them Germany Knorr company Monopolies more than 80% of the global high iron brake pads market. High-speed trains in China since its opening,  the brake pads of braking system relies on imports for long-term. Import brake pads has problems aush as high price, long cycle of supply, spare parts supply not in time and poor after-sales service. High-speed rail brake pads is n technology protection period before 2012, has been importing foreign products. In recent years the domestic represented by Tianyishangjia and PuRan private enterprises gradually enter the field of high-speed rail brake pads. Tianyishangjia in September 2013 got seven models 5 types of brake pads CRCC certificate of railways product, PuRan got CRCC certification in 2014. In 2015, BoShen tool has finished the high-speed train brakes 1:1 brake friction wear performance test.

The largest benefit link of wearable devices-Powder metal injection molding

Since the beginning of the "smart wave acceleration innovation, Chinese enterprises rise" report to repeated analysis
Google will lead the wave of innovation for the next five years. Apple will accelerate innovation, wearable devices will beanother hot spot after smartphones, further analysis is as follows:

"from small to big, and then from big to small" the cycle of 2009 apples open smartphone wave, As smartphones screen size grow from 3.5 inch to 5-6 inches, now it is limited. Future consumer electronics innovation will enter the era of from big to small size, all kinds of wearable will be released next year densely. Smart watches, apple iWatch went draw ahead (there will be the product distribution of all kinds of class), Google xWatch behind, a large number of imitators. Smart glasses, GoogleGlass user version is more and more close, a large number of imitators to follow up, besides xEye etc. new products also in research and development. Wearable devices via bluetooth 4.0 technology and sensor technology will further solve human entertainment, social, life, education and health care needs. And explore and innovate applications outside of all kinds of consumer electronics.

FPC, mems, and powder metallurgy: three big benefit links of wearable devices. The weekly newspaper and report
analysis for many times, after the outbreak of wearable equipment mems, FPC and powder metallurgy are the three most benefit industries. The combination of these three application will bring more user experience, more data sensing, more deformation application. Make people's entertainment, work, social, education and health care demand combine better. 

Powder metallurgy technology is the key to automobile weight loss and environmental protection

As the the improvement of economy and living standards, the car has got popularity in the family, under the premise that the momentum of the development of the car industry is becoming higher and higher. Car now, because of the advocate energy conservation and environmental protection are required to reduce fuel and emission quantity, one of the most key initiatives is to reduce car weight.

And to do this, powder metallurgy technology has irreplaceable role. Data show that with the applied powder metallurgy in the car, on average every car has 5 kg of powder metallurgy parts, like on the engine, valve seat, etc. Engine temperature have been reduced after using powder metallurgy parts. While valve seat made of powder metallurgy, on the premise of temperature reducing the thermal conductivity is improved a lot.

There is a commonly used titanium alloy powder metallurgy on the car, using it can reduce the weight of the car, increase the service life of the car, at the same time can achieve the accuracy requirement.

Thermoelectric materials made by Powder metallurgy

Powder metallurgy method making thermoelectric materials bismuth telluride (Bi2Te3) alloy, working temperature isclose to 450 ℃ can be used in the manufacture of household refrigerator, air conditioner, small detectors and sensors, etc. Bismuth telluride with a small amount of antimony telluride (Sb2Te3) alloying can form P type semiconductor solid solution, and with a small amount of bismuth selenide (Bi2Se3) alloying can form N type semiconductor solid solution. Bismuth telluride, it and other components to forming alloy have highly anisotropic structure. the most commonly used method making bismuth telluride alloy is single crystal directional crystallization. But this method is low productivity, segregation, and poor mechanical properties.

Canada after three years development, has developed a method of of producing bismuth telluride alloy by powder
metallurgy. It is mechanical alloying 2-5 mm diameter granular pure elements (such as Bi, TeSeSb) powder in a ball mill, after about 3h can be obtained for 5~10 m particle size alloy powders. Powder is cold pressed under the pressure of 360 mpa , compact body relative density of 80%, And hot extrusion in inert atmosphere into the 963.5 mm bar, extrusion temperature 420-490 ℃. The extrusion speed of 2 mm/min, products is dense after hot extrusion. Although extrusion materials is polycrystalline, but have no difference thermoelectric performance with single crystal material.

Material compression strength is 105 mpa, and the single crystal materials is only 20 mpa, grain boundaries hinder crack propagation of polycrystalline materials. This is helpful to improve its mechanical properties and the reliability of the thermoelectric devices. Manufacturing thermoelectric materials of powder metallurgy method can reduce the production cost, increase productivity, and has no damage.

Rare earth permanent magnetic material application in military field

Rare earth elements have excellent magnetic properties, it comes from the unique electronic structure of the rare earth.The 4f electronic shell has more unpaired electrons, such as trivalent gadolinium ion unpaired electrons reached 7, canproduce large magnetic moment. In addition because lanthanide 4f electronic shell with 5s, 5p, metallic state also has 6s shell, this makes 4f electronic shell is less influenced by external crystal field. This nature is not only reflected in its narrow spectral lines, good monochromaticity, and can reflect on their magnetic properties. 4f electronic shell orbital magnetic moment will not be "frozen", atomic magnetic moment to show the orbital magnetic moment and the sum of the spin magnetic moment, its value is bigger. Rare earth elements has more excellent magnetic properties. It can be used for the preparation of magnetic materials with various kinds of performance. Mainly including rare earth permanent magnet material, magnetic refrigeration materials, magnetostrictive materials.
Development of rare earth permanent magnet materials has experienced three generations:
The first generation of SmCo5 permanent magnetic material, the second generation of Sm2Co17 permanent magnetic material, the third generation of ndfeb permanent magnet material (Nb-Fe-B). So to speak, rare earth permanent magnet application in military field are everywhere. In regular communication, one end convert the voice signal into electrical signal, the other end convert electrical signal into sound signal, both need the aid of electromagnet, the motor converts electrical energy into kinetic energy, generator transforms mechanical energy into electricity needs assistance of the magnet. In the guidance of cruise missile, the effect of permanent magnet is very important. Such as the Gulf War showing great power missile "the patriot" used 4kg of ndfeb permanent magnet materials. Domestic long sword, red bird, eagle series missile is also dependent on the high performance of rare earth permanent magnet materials.

The critical factors that influencing the development of MIM

As a new type of processing and forming technology, the development of metal powder injection molding are influenced by several key factors, these factors determine the development prospects of the technology, the development speed and development trend. Study well, these factors can promote the further development of metal powder injection molding, solved bad will be the resistance of development.

Material consists of Metal injection molding technology includes metal powder and binder. In simple terms, metal powder and binder with certain proportion, mixing according to the rules of feed way and order at high temperature and the effect of shear stress to obtain the uniform structure of feeding, and then the granulate. Due to the existence of the binder, granulated materials has good flow property on when injection, and can be fully populated into the mold cavity. After forming, the green body through degreasing process to remove the organic component, and then sintering and densification, the finished product can be obtained.

Since the 1970s to the present just a few decades, metal powder injection molding technology has made great development and progress, but also exposed some deficiencies of the current technical route and process route. These weaknesses objectively prevent the development of the technology to a deeper level. Thus solving these deficiencies is the top priority.