Systematic Review of Powder Metallurgy: Current Overview of Manufactured Materials and Challenges for Future Research

Abstract

The journey toward foundry and the increasing implementation of Powder Metallurgy are evoking replacing traditional Sand Casting, thus, creating new challenges and opportunities. To take advantage of these opportunities and deal with the challenges, we must gain a holistic understanding of the emerging technical interactions and apply new approaches and methods when introducing new technologies and designing Powder Metallurgy. In this paper, we present the findings of a systematic literature review, consisting of quantitative and qualitative data, focusing on investigating Powder Metallurgy, as an alternative to traditional Sand Casting, by comparing certain characteristics of either process to synthesize the existing information of each method and to present an overview of manufactured materials. Although results indicate an increasing current trend in research publications, showing Powder Metallurgy with many advantages over traditional casting, the latter continues to be implemented as the preferred option in industries with low-level casting production. Given that the studies indicate greater advances in Powder Metallurgy methods over traditional casting, we identified the need for more research on the former under different contexts and therefore recommend it as an approach for future studies of metal casting. This review both reorganizes the available knowledge on Powder Metallurgy, as well as it makes an important methodological contribution by applying a review in Materials science, where there is little to no systematic research, which often means failure to provide sufficient help to implement Powder Metallurgy. Based on these findings, we point to future research needs, highlighting the need for further empirical evidence and improved collaboration between the topics of Mechanical Engineering, Manufacturing Processes, and Materials science, as well as with practitioners.