Elastic behaviour under compressive stresses states of sintered metallic parts

The mechanical response in service of a component is mainly determined by its elastic behaviour. Traditionally, metallic materials have been characterized by means of tensile tests, even in the case of sintered ones. In this condition, the elasticity of sintered parts has been always supposed to be linear, with a Young modulus dependent on the density. However, no attention has received the elastic behaviour under compressive stresses. In this work, the authors present the results obtained from cyclic uniaxial compression tests applied on sintered metallic samples with different densities. The elastic behaviour under compression is no longer linear and different mechanisms occur during the deformation process. Assuming a power law relating compressive stress and strain, an elastic modulus dependent on the density and the loading path has been obtained