Selective Laser Sintering to Produce NI-SN Intermetallics

A model system has been employed to investigate .the use of selective laser sintering (SLS) with a post-processing step to produce a compound having different properties than the precursor powders. The powder mixture examined consisted of95% (59% Ni and 41%8n) plus 5% ZnC12. This weight fraction of nickel and. tin produces. the intermetallic compound Ni3Sn upon equilibrium annealing. ZnCl2 was used as a wetting agent. Parts were fabricated using SLS and were then post-process annealed to create the intermetallic. Metallographic techniques and x-ray powder diffraction were used.to characterize the parts before and after annealing.