Fabrication of Micro-structured Parts by Nano-Imprint Lithography Sacrificial Plastic Mold Insert MIM using Nanoscale Copper Powder

International Conference on Injection Molding of Metal, Ceramics and Carbides (MIM2010)

Abstract:
This study aims to develop the manufacturing method of micro-structured parts by the metal powder injection molding (MIM) inserted micro-sacrificial plastic molds which were prepared by nano-imprint lithography (NIL) technique. In this process named NIL/μ-SPiMIM, the feedstock composed of nanoscale copper powder and polyacetal-based binder was adequately prepared and molded into polymethylmethacrylate films with fine line-scan structures, and it was sintered in a reductive gas atmosphere followed by solvent debinding of the films. The filling rate of feedstock into micro-channels and transcriptional property in sintered parts was evaluated by cross-sectional SEM observation. The experimental results revealed reasonable evidences using nanoscale powder could sinter at lower temperature but was not easily full-filled the feedstock into narrow cavity molds. It can be concluded that the manufacturing method named NIL/μ-SPiMIM proposed in this study has great potential to produce precisely 3 dimensional complex metallic parts with the micro-structures.