Effects of Powder Size and Initial Arrangement on Cold Compaction

In the past, the most common assumption in every explicit modelling of individual powders for compaction is that powders have only one single size which are arranged uniformly. However, all powders used in practice have a distribution of particle size and random initial arrangement. In this work, a systematic theoretical study of the effects of initial powder arrangement and distribution of size has been investigated using numerical analysis tool. Various types of elements have been considered first. Considering the accuracy and the effort required, the two-dimensional plane strain element has been employed for the rest of the investigation. The initial arrangement of powder and the distribution of powder size were considered separately. The results show that the initial arrangement has significant influence on the macroscopic behaviour while the powder size has little influence. Both factors have noticeable influence on the microscopic behaviour.