Reaction Sintering of Fe-Al Powder Mechanically Activated

The mixture of Fe and Al powder was mechanically activated and sintered to study a non-melting method of producing the intermetallics Fe₃Al. High-energy ball milling was used as an activation method, X-ray diffraction and SEM were chosen to analyze the materials variation before and after activation and sintering, and hot press of Fe-Al powder was inveshgated to compare mechanical activation with sintering. The results show that combining mechanical activation with reaction sintering can complete the transformation from pure Fe and Al powder to intermetallics. It is difficult to do the transformation by either mechanical activation or hot press.