Award-winning MIM parts

At the Euro PM2008 Congress & Exhibition, the latest gathering of the European powder metallurgy community sponsored by the European Powder Metallurgy Assn. (Shrewsbury, UK; www.epma.com), prizes were awarded to MIM components exhibiting excellence in design, execution, and the use of powder metallurgy.

One of the big winners was a micro-MIM planet carrier with a sun gear from Parmaco Metal Injection Molding AG (Fischingen, Switzerland; www.parmaco.com). Parmaco’s customer needed an economical method to produce about 12 million of these tiny components for planetary gearboxes that have a 6.2-mm OD. They’re used in a mechanism to open and close mobile phones.

Micro-MIM proved to be the most cost-effective means of making them in high volumes. They’re manufactured as single, unified parts, eliminating the need to assemble five parts into one. Cost savings were around 40%.

Two other metal injection molders also were awarded for their efforts at the expo—MIMItalia Srl (Vado Ligure SV; www.mimitalia.com) and Maxon Motor GmbH (Sexau, Germany; www.maxonmotor.com).—[email protected]