• Resources Recycling
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• v.19 no.4
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• pp.41-50
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• 2010

A fundamental study was carried out to develop a process for recycling tungsten and cobalt from WC-Co hardmetal sludge generated in the manufacturing process of hardmetal tools. The complete extraction of cobalt and simultaneous formation of tungstic was achieved by treating the sludge using aqua regia. The effect of aqua regia concentration, reaction temperature and time, pulp density on cobalt leaching and tungstic acid formation was investigated. The complete leaching of cobalt was attained at the optimum conditions: 100 vol.% aqua regia concentration, $100^{\circ}C$ temperature, 60 min. reaction time and 400 g/L pulp density. A complete conversion of tungsten carbide of the sludge to tungstic acid was however, obtained at the pulp densities lower than 150 g/L under the above condition. The progress of reaction during the aqua regia treatment of the sludge was monitored through the XRD phase identification of the residue. The metallic impurities in the tungstic acid so produced could be further removed as insoluble residues by dissolving the tungsten values in ammonia solution. The ammonium paratungstate($(NH_4)_{10}{\cdot}H_2W_{12}O_{42}{\cdot}4H_2O$) of 99.85% purity was prepared from the ammonium polytungstate solution by the evaporation crystallization method.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 1999.07d
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• pp.1699-1701
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• 1999

We prepared diamond thin films on WC-Co substrate in $H_2-CH_4-O_2$ gas mixture using 13.56MHz RF PACVD. Scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy were used to analyze the nature of thin film. and Rockwell test to analyze the adhesion between thin film and substrate. The good diamond quality and adhesion was appeared with cemented tungsten carbide substrate treated with oxygen plasma.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society for Technology of Plasticity Conference
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• 2002.02a
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• pp.187-194
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• 2002

This paper describes the experimental results on direct selective laser sintering of WC-Co mixture for rapid tooling. The experiments were carried out within an air, argon and nitrogen atmosphere. Coupons of single layer were sintered at various laser powers, scanning speeds and scan spacings. As the energy density (energy per unit scanned area) is increased, the thickness of coupons is increased. The main problem took place during sintering within an air atmosphere was severe oxidation of WC-Co mixture. As the laser power is increased and/or scanning speed is decreased, more severe oxidation occurred. Within an argon and nitrogen atmosphere the oxidation is reduced significantly. Experiments on multi-layer sintering were also carried out.

• Journal of Powder Materials
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.119-198
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• 1994

The characteristics of various important microstructural factors of WC-base hard- metals (cemented carbides) such as the amount of Co metal binder phase, the carbide grain size, the microstructural defects acting as a fracture source, the solid solubility of tungsten in the binder phase affected by the carbon content, the precipitation of $Co_3W$, the domain size of binder phase, the formation of ${\beta}-free$ layer or Co-rich layer and CVD or PVD coated layer, and the effects of these factors on the flexural strength of the hardmetals are reviewed.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.13 no.12
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• pp.850-854
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• 2003

The abrasion wear behavior on the hardfacing weld was investigated by performing abrasion wear, hardness, and microstructural tests. The gas metal arc(GMA) weld was produced by using the cored wire which was filled with the hard metal, i.e., the recycled tungsten carbide (WC) reinforced metal matrix composite. For 30% addition of the hard metal, the abrasion wear resistance was significantly improved comparing with that for 20% addition of the hard metal. Above 30% addition of the hard metal, however, there was no significant improvement of the wear resistance. The improvement of the wear resistance was due to the increased amount of eutectic carbides(W$_{6}$C) which was formed during GMA welding. For the weld in which the hard metal was added to 30-40%, an optimum level of abrasion wear resistance was performed.

• Journal of Advanced Marine Engineering and Technology
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• v.26 no.6
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• pp.661-669
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• 2002

Rapid tooling technique enables us to make dies and molds that produce prototype parts with the correct material at a substantially reduced cost and time. In this study, experiments on selective laser sintering of tungsten carbide-cobalt mixture were carried out to find optimal sintering conditions that will be applied to rapid metal tooling. The experiments were carried out within an air, an argon and a nitrogen atmosphere. Coupons of single layer were sintered at various laser powers, scanning speeds and scan spacings. Very severe oxidation took place within an air atmosphere. The oxidation is reduced significantly within an argon and a nitrogen atmosphere. The thickness of the sintered coupons is increased as the energy density, the laser energy Per unit scanned area, is increased. Several multi-layer sintering experiments were also carried out.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.229-233
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• 2011

Diamond thin films were deposited on pretreated Co cemented tungsten carbide (WC-6%Co) inserts as substrate by microwave plasma chemical vapor deposition (MPCVD) system, equipped with a 915MHz, 30kW generator for generating a large-size plasma. The substrates were pretreated with two solutions Murakami solution $[KOH:K_3Fe(CN)_6:H_2O]$ and nitric solution $[HNO_3:H_2O]$ to etch, WC and Co at cemented carbide substrates, respectively. The deposition experiments were performed at an input power of 10 kW and in a total pressure of 100 torr. The influence of various $CH_4$ contents on the crystallinity and morphology of the diamond films deposited in MPCVD was investigated using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and Raman spectroscopy. The diamond film synthesized by the $CH_4$ plasma shows a triangle-faceted (111) diamond. As $CH_4$ contents was increased, the thickness of diamond films increased and the faceted planes disappeared. Finally, Faceted diamond changed into nano-crystalline diamond with random crystallinity.

• Proceedings of the Korean Powder Metallurgy Institute Conference
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• 2006.09a
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• pp.109-110
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• 2006

We have studied the effect of C/Ti atomic ratio of TiCx (x=0.5, 0.75 and 1.0) raw powder on the properties of the Ti-Mo-WTiC sintered hard alloy. The decrease of C/Ti atomic ratio accelerated the densification in the sintering process. The hardness was remarkably improved up to 1350HV with decreasing the C/Ti atomic ratio because of increase of TiCx phase volume content and its fine dispersion. From the results of electro-chemical tests in acid and 3% NaCl solutions, it was obvious that every alloy had excellent corrosion resistance, which meant about 200 times better than that of WC-Co cemented carbide.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 1999.11a
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• pp.398-401
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• 1999

We prepared diamond thin films on WC-Co substrate in a mixtured $H_2-CH_4-O_2$, gas, using 13.%MHz RF PACVD. Scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction and Rarnan spectroscopy were used to analyze the characteristics of thin film, and tribometer of ball-on-disk type were used to test the wear resistance between thin film and substrate. The good diamond quality and wear resistance was appeared with cemented tungsten carbide substrate treated with oxygen plasma.

• Tribology and Lubricants
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.56-61
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• 2015

In this study, we investigated the effectiveness of an ultrasonic nanocrystal surface modification (UNSM) technique on the mechanical and wear properties of tungsten carbide (WC). The UNSM technique is a newly developed surface modification technique that increases the mechanical properties of materials by severe plastic deformation. The objective of this study was to improve the wear resistance of press die made of WC by applying the UNSM technique. We observed the microstructures of the untreated and UNSM-treated specimens using a scanning electron microscope (SEM), and energy-dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX) was used to investigate the chemical composition. The SEM observations showed the pore size and the number of pores decreased after the UNSM treatment. We assessed the wear behavior of both the untreated and UNSM-treated specimens using a scratch test. The test results showed that the wear resistance of the UNSM-treated specimens increased by about 46% compared with the untreated specimens. This may be attributed to increased hardness, reduced surface roughness, induced compressive residual stress, and refined grain size following the application of the UNSM technique. In addition, we found that the UNSM treatment increased the carbon concentration to 63% from 33%. We expect that implementing the findings of this study will lead to an increase in the life of press dies.