Process for producing tungsten heavy alloy billets

A process for producing tungsten heavy alloy billets is described comprising: (a) forming a uniform blend of elemental powders to form tungsten alloys having a tungsten content of equal to or less than about 91% by weight and wherein the particle size of the tungsten is no less than about 2 micrometers in diameter; (b) uniformly packing the powder blend into a container, the container being made of material having thermal expansion similar to the powder blend; (c) sintering the powder blend in a hydrogen atmosphere at a temperature sufficient to impart strength to the powder and to reduce oxides and remove volatile impurities from the powder without significant densification in the powder; and (d) solid state sintering the resulting strengthened powder in a reducing atmosphere at a sufficient temperature to densify the powder to at least about 90% of the theoretical density but at a temperature below the liquid phase sintering temperature of the powder blend to form the billet