Aluminium alloy foam is a lightweight material with high energy absorption properties and can potentially replace bulk Al-components. The aim of this work is to develop a brazing technique to join aluminium facing sheets to aluminium alloy foam to obtain aluminium foam sandwich panels for applications where high service temperature is a requirement. Al-6016 alloy sheets were brazed to aluminium alloy foam using two aluminium based (Al-Cu-Mg and Al-Si-Mg-Ti) metal glasses at 560 • C-590 • C in an argon atmosphere. Microstructure and microhardness profiles of the aluminium alloy sheet/aluminium alloy foam brazed joints were analysed using a microhardness tester and scanning electron microscope equipped with electron dispersion spectroscopy. A three-point bending test was conducted to study the flexural behaviour of the aluminium foam sandwich composite panels.

Lean duplex stainless steels have similar corrosion and better mechanical properties than the austenitic grades, which ensure their extensive spreading in industrial applications as a substitute of austenitic grades. In the construction of liquid tanks, however, it is often necessary to weld such steels with a range of fittings which are commonly fabricated with austenitic stainless steel grades. Therefore, this paper examines dissimilar welded joints between LDX 2101 (or X2CrMnNiN22-5-2) lean duplex stainless steels plates and austenitic stainless steel pipes, carried out by different arc welding processes. The investigation focuses on the correlation between the welding procedures and the microstructural and mechanical properties of the welded joints.