A powder metallurgy route is described as a promising route to produce highly active Raney-Ni electrodes. An expanded Ni mesh was used as metallic substrate on the surface of which Raney-Ni phases were produced via a heat-treatment step using Al powder at different loads. The overpotential at -300 mA/cm(2) as well as the active surface area were determined to evaluate the electrodes. The results reveal that a high Al loading is necessary to achieve a stable electrode and a high activity for the hydrogen evolution reaction. (c) The Author(s) 2019. Published by ECS.

Today fine spherical iron powders are produced dominantly by the carbonyl process. It is used for innovative solutions for a wide spectrum of different applications like diamond tools, magnetorheological fluids, materials absorbing microwaves but mostly for metal injection molding (MIM). Herewith the high powder price has a considerable share on the product costs and is therefore a limiting fact. In this paper the powder properties and sintering results of a fine spherical iron powder which is produced by using iron oxide as a by-product of steelmakers and a patented hydrogen reduction processes will be discussed. Further powder processing steps were identified to separate the sinter cake and adjust the powder properties. Milling technologies and parameters were evaluated which support the particle shearing and spheroidization. The characterized sintered parts demonstrate the high potential of the cost-efficient powder with comparable properties to that of the carbonyl iron powder.

Particle design becomes a requirement if certain properties of metallic, intermetallic or ceramic powders have to be tailored. The hybridization process allows optimisation of powder properties as spheroidisation, agglomeration or change of chemical composition of the material by coating of particles. Using this technology powder properties as flow behaviour, bulk and tap density can be tailored to the requirements of the process. Furthermore composite materials can be produced by coating core particles with powders of different chemical composition. The paper reports on the hybridization technology as well as results obtained in the fields of binderless agglomeration of fine metallic powders, particle modification and preparation of composite powders.