Method for producing highly porous metallic moulded bodies close to the desired final contours

The invention relates to a method for producing highly porous, metallic moulded bodies. The inventive method consists of the following steps: a metallic powder used as a starting material is mixed with a dummy; a green body is pressed out of the mixture; the green body is subjected to conventional mechanical machining, the dummy advantageously increasing the stability of the green body; the dummy material is thermally separated from the green body by means of air, a vacuum or an inert gas; and the green body is sintered to form the moulded body and is then advantageously finished. Suitable materials for the dummy are, for example, ammonium bicarbonate or carbamide. The mechanical machining carried out before the sintering advantageously enables a simple production close to the desired final contours, even for complicated geometries of the moulded body to be produced, without impairing the porosity, and without high wear of the tools. The workpiece is advantageously sufficiently stable in terms of pressure for the green machining as the dummy material is still present in the pores of the green body during the machining.