Sintering of Spherical Particles of Equal and Different Size Arranged in a Body Centered Cubic Structure

Solid-state sintering of a bcc structure of spherical particles has been studied numerically by use of simple shape parameters to describe the state of the unit cell. Both free and pressure-assisted sintering of particles of equal and different sizes for various ratios of boundary and surface diffusion have been considered. At low relative densities, the evolution of particle radius, interparticle junction radius and shrinkage predicted by the bee model are rather similar to sintering of a simple row of particles. At higher densities, the porosity closes up; that is, the junctions start to interact, or the next-nearest neighbours in the particle structure attain contact. Quantative measures of the density at the transition from open pore space between the particles to closed porosity as well as the density at which the next-nearest neighbours start to touch are derived. Furthermore, different dihedral angles and the evolution of relative density and sintering stresses are studied.