THE EFFECT OF SHAPE ON INTERMETHOD CORRELATION OF TECHNIQUES FOR CHARACTERIZING THE SIZE DISTRIBUTION OF POWDER .1. CORRELATING THE SIZE DISTRIBUTION MEASURED BY SIEVING, IMAGE-ANALYSIS, AND DIFFRACTOMETER METHODS

In recent years, powder technologists have been increasingly concerned with powder systems having irregular grain shape and texture. Of part icular concern is the effect of the shape of the powder grains on the size distribution data generated by characterization methods based on various physical principles. In particular, as many laboratories switc hed to modern procedures based on analysis of diffraction patterns, th e need to know the effect of particle shape on the data generated by t he newer methods, as compared to information gathered using classical methods such as sieving or image analysis, has, grown. In this study c omparative data generated by sieving, image analysis, and diffractomet er studies of four iron powders, are reported and discussed.