Submitted Abstract
The RHAMEP corporate PhD project aims to understand the physical processes taking place during the processing of hard metal pastes (HMP). HMPs are mixtures of hard metal grains with a liquid organic binder. The rheological properties of HMPs are important parameters influencing the production process. The rheological behaviour of pastes highly depends on the volume and mass ratio of solid and liquid phases, grain size, grain size distribution as well as the type of the organic binder. Choice of these parameters are always a trade-off between required stiffness (necessary for handling) and the thermal processability of parts which are shaped from HMPs. This project aims at using state of the art characterisation methods in rheology (e.g. capillary rheology and small-angle oscillatory shear rheology) and/or DMA (dynamic mechanical analysis) to understand the flow behaviour and the mechanical properties (complex moduli) of HMPs. These characterization techniques are expected to lead to the determination of suitable constitutive physical models and relevant boundary conditions for the simulation of HMP extrusion (not in the scope of this project).