Nanostructural characteristics and sintering behavior of W-Cu composite powder prepared by mechanical alloying

W-Cu alloy is one of the promising materials for heat sinks and packaging i n the microelectronic devices due to its good thermal properties. In the pr esent study, nanostructured (NS) W-Cu composite powder was prepared by the mechanical alloying (MA), and their nanostructural evolutions with milling times were analyzed by SEM, XRD and TEM. MA W-Cu powder milled for 50 hours was characterized by equiaxed shape with mean particle size of 2-3 mu m, a nd crystalline size was about 20-30nm. The MA NS W-20wt%Cu and W-30wt%Cu po wders compacts had shown the high sinterability, resulting in a nearly full density by sintering at 1100 degrees C. The enhanced sinterability of MA W -Cu composite powder was attributed to the nanostructural characteristics o f W and Cu phases as well as the activated sintering of Fe-impurity.