A cBN material and a method of making a cBN material, the method including the steps of providing a powder mixture comprising cBN grains, aluminum and a Ti(CxNyOz)a powder, subjecting the powder mixture to a milling to form a powder blend, subjecting the powder blend to a forming operation to form a green body, subjecting the green body to a pre-sintering step, at a temperature between 650 to 950 C., to form a pre-sintered body, and subjecting the pre-sintered body to a HPHT operation to form the cBN material. For the Ti(CxNyOz)a powder, 0.05z0.4. In addition, a cBN material includes cBN grains, an Al2O3 phase, a binder phase of TiC, TiN and/or TiCN, W and Co, whereby a quotient Q is <0.25 of the cBN material.

Provided is a method for modifying a metal alloy for use in additive manufacturing. The method includes providing a metal alloy; providing at least one grain refiner; forming a melt pool that includes the at least one metal alloy and the at least one grain refiner; and solidifying at least a portion the melt pool to form a modified alloy.

A lightweight, selectively degradable composite material includes a compacted powder mixture of a first powder and a second powder. The first powder comprises first metal particles comprising Mg, Al, Mn, or Zn, having a first particle oxidation potential. The second powder comprises low-density ceramic, glass, cermet, intermetallic, metal, polymer, or inorganic compound second particles. At least one of the first particles and the second particles includes a metal coating layer of a coating material disposed on an outer surface having a coating oxidation potential that is different than the first particle oxidation potential. The compacted powder mixture has a microstructure comprising: a matrix comprising the first metal particles; the second particles dispersed within the matrix; and a network comprising interconnected adjoining metal coating layers that extends throughout the matrix, the lightweight, selectively degradable composite material having a density of about 3.5 g/cm.sup.3 or less.

We have developed a scalable approach to directly incorporate grain-refining nanoparticles into conventional hot-tear-susceptible aluminum alloy powders. These aluminum alloy powders may be additively manufactured into high-strength, crack-free aluminum alloys with fine equiaxed microstructures by incorporating nanoparticle nucleants to control solidification during additive manufacturing. Some variations provide an additively manufactured aluminum alloy comprising aluminum, one or more strengthening elements, and at least one grain-refining element, wherein the additively manufactured aluminum alloy has a microstructure with equiaxed grains. Aluminum alloys with grain refiners are useful in many processes beyond additive manufacturing. Some variations provide an aluminum alloy comprising aluminum, copper, magnesium, at least one of zinc or silicon, and grain-refining nanoparticles selected from zirconium, tantalum, niobium, or titanium, wherein the aluminum alloy has a microstructure that is substantially crack-free with equiaxed grains.

A composite material comprising a plurality of hard particles surrounded by a matrix material comprising a plurality of nanoparticles. Earth boring tools including the composite material and methods of forming the composite material are also disclosed. A polycrystalline material having a catalyst material including nanoparticles in interstitial spaces between inter-bonded crystals of the polycrystalline material and methods of forming the polycrystalline material are also disclosed.

An additive manufacturing method of producing a metal alloy article may involve: Providing a supply of a metal alloy in powder form; providing a supply of a nucleant material, the nucleant material lowering the nucleation energy required to crystallize the metal alloy; blending the supply of metal alloy powder and nucleant material to form a blended mixture; forming the blended mixture into a first layer; subjecting at least a portion of the first layer to energy sufficient to raise the temperature of the first layer to at least the liquidus temperature of the metal alloy; allowing at least a portion of the first layer to cool to a temperature sufficient to allow the metal alloy to recrystallize; forming a second layer of the blended mixture on the first layer; and repeating the subjecting and allowing steps on the second layer to form an additional portion of the metal alloy article.

A composite material comprising a plurality of hard particles surrounded by a matrix material comprising a plurality of nanoparticles. Earth boring tools including the composite material and methods of forming the composite material are also disclosed. A polycrystalline material having a catalyst material including nanoparticles in interstitial spaces between inter-bonded crystals of the polycrystalline material and methods of forming the polycrystalline material are also disclosed.

Solid immiscible alloys and methods for making the solid immiscible alloys are provided. The microstructure of the immiscible alloys is characterized by a minority phase comprising a plurality of particles of an inorganic material dispersed in a majority phase comprising a continuous matrix of another inorganic material. The methods utilize nanoparticles to control both the collisional growth and the diffusional growth of the minority phase particles in the matrix during the formation of the alloy microstructure.

A wear resistant material is manufactured from a Ni-based alloy powder and an additive. The Ni-based alloy powder includes the following components in mass fraction: C: 0.11.1%, Si: 0.56.0%, Fe: 2.515.0%, B: 0.25.0%, CrB.sub.2: 6.026.0%, and the balance of Ni. The Ni-based alloy powder is employed as the main component and CrB.sub.2 and WC are added, thus improving the wear resistance of the wear resistant material. Experimental data show that, the wear resistant material provided in the present disclosure has the hardness up to 7080 HRC and excellent wear resistance. A wear resistant impeller can be manufactured from the wear resistant material.

A refractory metal matrix-ceramic compound multi-component composite material with the super-high melting point is disclosed. At least one ceramic compound A and at least one refractory bonding metal B are fused together by the smelting process to make the multi-component composite material. The fused ingredients of the multi-component composite material are mAnB, and 2(m+n)13. The positive integer m is the number of the kinds of the ceramic components A, and the positive integer n is the number of the kinds of the refractory bonding metals B. The absolute value of the combining enthalpy of the ceramic compound A is larger than the absolute value of the combining enthalpy between the ceramic compound A and the refractory bonding metal B. The material has the properties including over 3000 C. melting point, high stability, hardness, ductility, and fusibility in high or low temperature, fast production, and low cost.