A New Approach for Manufacturing a High Porosity Ti-6Al-4V Scaffolds for Biomedical Applications

Titanium and its alloys are currently considered as one of the most important metallic materials used in the biomedical applications, due to their excellent mechanical properties and superior biocompatibility. In the present study, a new effective method for fabricating high porosity titanium alloy scaffolds was developed. Porous Ti-6Al-4V scaffolds are successfully fabricated with porosities ranging from 30% to 70% using spaceholder and powder sintering technique. Based on its acceptable properties, spherical carbamide particles with different diameters （0.56, 0.8, and 1mm） were used as the space-holder material in the present investigation. The Ti-6Al-4V scaffolds porosity is characterized by using scanning electron microscopy. The results show that the scaffolds spherical-shaped pores are depending on the shape, size and distribution of the space-holder particles. This investigation shows that the present new manufacturing technique is promising to fabricate a controlled high porosity and high purity Ti-6Al-4V scaffolds for hard tissue replacement.

Effect of Si_3N_4 Addition on the Mechanical Properties, Microstructures, and Wear Resistance of Ti-6Al-4V Alloy

In order to improve the wear resistance of Ti-6Al-4V, different amounts of Si3N4 powder were added into the alloy powder and sintered at 1250℃. Porous titanium alloy with higher wear resistance was successfully fabricated. At sintering temperature, reaction took place and a new hard phase of Ti5Si3 formed. The mechanical properties of the fabricated alloys with different amounts of Si3N4 addition were investigated. The hardness of Ti-6Al-4V, which is the index of wear resistance, was increased by the addition of Si3N4. Amounts of Si3N4 addition have very significant influences on hardness and compressive strength. In present study,titanium alloy with 5 wt pct Si3N4 addition has 62% microhardness and 45% overall bulk hardness increase,respectively. In contrast, it has a 16.4% strength reduction. Wear resistance was evaluated by the weight loss during wear test. A new phase of Ti5Si3 was detected by electron probe microanalyzer （EPMA） and X-ray diffraction （XRD） method. The original Si3N4 decomposed during sintering and transformed into titanium silicide. Porous structure was achieved due to the sintering reaction.

A Comparison between Direct and Indirect Laser Sintering of Metals

Layer manufacture technologies are gaining increasing attention in the manufacturing for the production of polymer mould tooling. Layer manufacture techniques can be used in this potential manufacturing area to produce tooling either indirectly or directly, and powder metal based layer manufacture systems are considered as an effective way of producing rapid tooling. Mechanical properties and accuracy are critical for tooling. This paper reports the results of an experimental study examining the potential of layer manufacturing processes to deliver production tooling for polymer manufacture. A comparison between indirectly selective laser sintering and directly selective laser sintering to provide the tooling was reported. Three main areas were addressed during the study： mechanical strength, accuracy, and build rate. Overviews of the results from the studies were presented.