Metal Powder Upcycling and Engineering: Unlocking New Capabilities in LPBF and Cold Spray

The webinar will focus on three practical approaches to increasing the value and performance of metal powders used in additive manufacturing and Cold Spray.

1. Upcycling oversize metal powders
   The first part will address the recovery of valuable powder fractions from oversize, agglomerated and off-spec powder streams.
   Rather than treating these materials as waste or low-value by-products, appropriate processing and classification can recover powder fractions suitable for demanding applications, including additive manufacturing.
   The presentation will discuss how powder upcycling can:
   Improve production yield of gas-atomized powders
   recover useful fractions from oversize material,
   reduce material losses and waste,
   improve raw-material utilization,
2. Improving existing powders through morphology modification
   The second topic will focus on how the performance of an existing powder can be improved without changing its chemical composition.
   By modifying particle morphology, removing undesirable particle fractions and improving particle shape and surface condition, powders can achieve better:
   flowability,
   packing behaviour,
   process stability,
   and overall feedstock consistency.
   The webinar will demonstrate how morphology engineering can turn an existing powder into a feedstock better suited for LPBF, Cold Spray and other powder-based processes.
3. Decorated powders and particle surface engineering
   The third part will focus on decorated metal powders, where micro- or nanoscale functional particles are attached to or embedded into the surface of larger metal powder particles.
   Mateusz Skałoń will present decorated powder products that are about to be or are already introduced to the market by Ultra Metal Powders and explain the technology used to create these materials.
   The presentation will cover:
   the concept of particle decoration,
   how micro- and nanoscale additives can be distributed across powder surfaces,
   how surface modification can change powder behaviour without fundamentally changing the base powder,
   and how this approach can influence properties such as laser energy absorption, deposition behaviour, process stability and final material performance.
   Examples of commercially available decorated powders will be presented together with the engineering concepts behind their development.
   Main takeaway
   The webinar will show three different ways of creating more value from metal powders:
   recovering valuable material from oversize powder streams, improving existing powders through morphology engineering, and creating new functionality through particle surface decoration.
   The common idea is that metal powder should not be viewed as a fixed commodity feedstock. Its properties can be actively engineered to improve process performance, material utilization and the capabilities of LPBF and Cold Spray technologies.
   About the speaker
   Dr. Mateusz Skałoń is the Co-Founder and CEO of Ultra Metal Powders. He has worked in powder metallurgy since 2010 and in metal additive manufacturing since 2016.
   His work focuses on the development, processing and commercialization of metal powders, including powder upcycling, aerodynamic classification, morphology modification, particle spheroidization and surface functionalization using micro- and nanoscale additives.