An efficient way to find the workability limit for powder metallurgy parts has been suggested. Compacts of Al-4%TiC, Al-4%WC, Al-4%Fe3C, and Al-4%Mo2C were produced to the relative density of 0.82 and 0.86 with three different geometries through primary operations of powder metallurgy routes. Each sintered compact was hot deformed to various strain levels till a visible crack appeared at the free surface. Oyane’s fracture principle was used to develop a theory to study powder metallurgy compacts. A least square technique was used to determine the constants in fracture criteria and these equations were finally used to find workability limit. It is found that the projected technique was well in agreement with the experimental values. 1. Introduction Powder metallurgy manufacturing technique is used to produce parts to close tolerance, intricate shapes, and near net shapes. It has proved to be cost effective of producing many parts such as porous materials, composite materials, refractory materials, and special high duty alloys [1–3] to be used in aircraft, automotive, and manufacturing industry. Further, powder metallurgy route is green manufacturing and energy efficient manufacturing compared to casting operation [4]. Aluminum metal matrix is used for wide range of industrial applications due to its exceptional properties such as low specific density, great strength, low thermal growth, and decent wear resistance and is cost-effective [5–9]. Ductile aluminum matrix strengthened with tougher and stiffer carbides offers a blend of properties of the metallic material and ceramic strengthening parts [10]. Titanium carbide and tungsten carbide based parts are presently used in high strength application where better strength, wear resistance, and corrosion resistance are necessary [11, 12] and aluminium reinforced with tungsten carbide prepared by warm accumulative roll bonding method exhibited enhanced mechanical properties [13]. The workability of the powder metallurgy parts plays an important part in defining if the powder metallurgy part will be shaped successfully or fracture initiates in the forming practice. Workability is the amount of deformation in which a material can sustain the induced internal stresses of forming prior to failure. Workability features are dependent not only on the material but also on numerous forming parameters such as stress and strain rate, porosity, friction, and temperature [14, 15]. Over the years, numerous models [16–18] were established to study workability of conventional parts; however, they cannot be directly applied
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