A new method to prepare composite powders customized for high temperature laser sintering

Composites have the potential to enhance the mechanical properties of components fabricated by additive manufacturing; however, the bottleneck is the limited number of polymeric composite powders available for this manufacturing process. This paper describes a generically new method to create composite powders that are suitable for High Temperature Laser Sintering (HT-LS). C-coated Inorganic Fullerene-like WS2 (IF-WS2) nanoparticles and graphene nanoplatelets (GNPs) have been chosen to demonstrate their incorporation into a high performance polymer matrix: Poly Ether Ether Ketone (PEEK). The morphological and physical property investigations have confirmed that the resulting composite powders exhibit the desired particle morphology, size, distribution and flowability for HT-LS applications. Further preliminary sintering results have demonstrated that they are comparable to the currently available commercial grade of PEEK powder HT-LS applications in terms of powder packing properties and flow ability. The new strategy reported here brings in great potential for the additive layer manufacturing of high performance polymeric composite components with improved mechanical and added functionalities by choosing the proper matrix and filler combination.