The effects of sintering schedule on the performance of stainless steel foam with 3-D open-celled network structure

The effects of sintering schedule on the shrinkage, open porosity and bending strength of the stainless steel foam with 3-D opened network structure were investigated in this paper. The experimental results show that the shrinkage of the sintered product increases and the open porosity decreases with the increase of sintering temperature and the prolongation of the soaked time; the bending strength of sintered product firstly rises and then declines with the sintering temperature rising; the prolongation of soaked time is favorable to raise the bending strength, however, the effect of soaked time on bending strength is less remarkable than that of sintering temperature. When the precursor is sintered at 1260°C for 30 min , the stainless steel foam with favorable 3-D and open cells network structure can be obtained, of which the aperture is about 1mm, the open porosity is 81.2% and the bending strength is 51.72 MPa.