Elasticity, fracture and yielding of cold compacted metal powders

The behaviour of powder compacts is modelled by explicitly introducing the possibility of plastic loading, elastic unloading and decohesion at contacts. The study is limited to cold compaction and to perfectly plastic materials for which the analysis of Mesarovic and Johnson (J. Mech. Phys. 48 (2000) 2009) is used. We model the compact behaviour both with an analytical approach based upon a mean field assumption and with the discrete element method (DEM) that allows force equilibrium to be treated in a realistic manner. Using these two approaches, we are able to predict the effective elastic properties of a powder compact at the onset of unloading. The knowledge of the conditions that lead to decohesion at the contact scale is used to model the fracture of the powder compact (green strength). It is shown that, in first approximation, green strength is inversely proportional to the size of the powder particles. The two methods are used to generate failure and yield surfaces for axisymmetric conditions. Both isostatic and close die conditions are studied.