Jet Penetration Performance of a Shaped Charge Liner Prepared by Metal Injection Molding

The metal injection molding (MIM) method was applied to manufacture a shaped charge liner (SCL) used for petroleum perforating bombs. Its application could overcome the drawback of heterogeneous density distribution prepared using the traditional powder metallurgy and spinning process. The sintering results showed that because of the limitation in the sintering temperature, the relative density of the W–Cu alloy shaped charge liners prepared by metal injection molding (MIM W–Cu SCLs) ranged from 48.05% at 1050 °C to 52.52% at 1100 °C, which was far below those prepared by spinning. Further increase to higher temperature led to the W–Cu separation, cracks, and distortion of the SCL. The explosive test proved that the shaped charge liners prepared by metal injection molding (MIM SCLs) could achieve comparable or even better penetration performance than those prepared by spinning. The particle size of tungsten played a significant role in the penetration performance in which the sample prepared from a −250-mesh tungsten powder showed the highest penetration depth, which was 18.44% deeper than that of the spinning process. From the observation of ballistic holes, the jet of the MIM SCL was composed of dispersed W–Cu particles without a slug. The diameters of the holes bored by the MIM SCLs were larger than those SCLs produced by spinning, which proved that the MIM SCL jet is noncoherent.