Microstructures of Powders and Additively Manufactured Objects of an Alloy Tool Steel for Cold-Work Dies

Micro-Texture Analyses of a Cold-Work Tool Steel for Additive Manufacturing

“…For metallic materials, it is generally implemented by selective melting of powder with laser or electron beams [3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10]. Many kinds of metallic powder have been tested for application in mechanical or functional parts [3,[6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] and a few new alloys dedicated to AM are being developed [14,21,22].…”

“…As they constitute the major part of the current engineering metals, steels can make a great contribution to the spread of AM applications. Among various steels, tool steels are well suited to AM [17][18][19][20][21][22][23], and become parts of the representative commercial steel powder for AM [23]. They generally have high alloy contents and suffer from excessive heterogeneities owing to segregation when they are provided via the conventional ingot metallurgy route [24].…”

“…They generally have high alloy contents and suffer from excessive heterogeneities owing to segregation when they are provided via the conventional ingot metallurgy route [24]. Thus, the fine and homogeneous microstructures produced by selective melting of powder [17][18][19][20][21][22] should be much more attractive. Machinability of the conventional wrought or cast tool steels is an important requirement by toolers [24], and the near-net-shape by AM should be another attraction to these difficult-to-machine materials.…”

“…In spite of the aforementioned advantages, only a limited number of documents are still found on the AM applications of tool steels [17][18][19][20][21][22], while most of them dealt with standard hot-work or plastic tool steels such as AISI H13 and P20 [17][18][19][20]. It would be harder to find ones that dealt with more highly alloyed cold-work tool steels [21,22].…”

“…In spite of the aforementioned advantages, only a limited number of documents are still found on the AM applications of tool steels [17][18][19][20][21][22], while most of them dealt with standard hot-work or plastic tool steels such as AISI H13 and P20 [17][18][19][20]. It would be harder to find ones that dealt with more highly alloyed cold-work tool steels [21,22]. Although those works reported some results of microscopic observations [17][18][19][20][21][22], more detailed and quantitative information on the morphologic and the crystallographic characteristics of the microstructures would improve the current knowledge for the AM of tool steels.…”