Abstract
One of the most economic ways in production of diamond composites is cold compaction of diamonds and metallic powder, and sintering of the compacted mixture. Complex loading situation of individual diamonds, which has physical contact with the die wall during the compaction, results in damaging of the press die. Replacing of press die is costly and time consuming. In order to increase the life time of the press tools, different hard PVD coatings were deposited on the inner surface of the die. Sintered bodies were produced using coated and uncoated moulds to analyse the effect of the hardness and friction coefficient of the die wall on the characteristics of the sintered body. The result evidenced that the lower friction coefficient and higher hardness of the die wall increase the hardness and the porosity of the sintered diamond composites.