A comparative study of the mechanical and tribological behaviours of different aluminium matrix–ceramic composites

Abstract

Aluminium matrix composites (AMCs) have great potential for critical applications within aerospace, automotive, defence, marine, agriculture and nuclear engineering sectors. The composite materials are very attractive because of their good balance between lightweight versus high strength and machinability. Depending on the particular application, these properties can be further enhanced by adding silicon carbide, boron carbide and graphite, respectively. These reinforcements help to upscale the physical/mechanical properties in order to meet the novel industrial demand. In the present work, a novel hybrid composite is developed through stir cast welding technique. The novel materials manufactured are of great importance, because they exhibit higher mechanical properties and better wear resistance with respect to classical materials (i.e. pure aluminium). The results of mechanical test showed that the addition of 5% boron carbide content to aluminium matrix permits to enhance the tensile properties, shear strength and hardness values; 6% silicon carbide and 4% graphite allow to improve the flexural strength and wear rate, respectively. The best performance was obtained for aluminium composite with 5 wt% boron carbide. The correlation between industrial requirements and the findings from this research indicates that the newly developed composite is an excellent candidate material for structural neutron absorber, armour plate and as a substrate material for computer hard discs.

ZrB2 nanoparticles transmuting tribological properties of Al3Zr/AA5052 composite

“…However, multiple particulate reinforcements in the PRAMCs improve wear resistance extensively. Different materials have been synthesized by multiple reinforcements with promising results [6][7][8][9], but the work is limited with Al 3 Zr and ZrB 2 combination [1,[10][11][12]. The Al 3 Zr exhibits low density, high melting point and high elastic modulus with excellent resistance to oxidation and corrosion [2].…”

Analysis of the Performances of a New Type of Alumina Nanocomposite Structural Material Designed for the Thermal Insulation of High-Rise Buildings

“…The target test piece is constructed as two sheets of 4 mm thick transparent glass sandwiched between a 4 mm thick alumina aerogel translucent material layer. The structure of the comparative test piece was a translucent film attached to ordinary 4 m thick flat glass [18]. This ensures that the light transmittance of the contrast specimen is equal to the target specimen.…”

Mechanical and tribological characteristics of boron carbide reinforcement of AA6061 matrix composite

“…It was observed that the weight reduces while increasing the B 4 C particle content into the base metal. The distribution of hard particles in the matrix entails a higher resistance to abrasive wear that can be linked to reduced mating surface of the matrix and higher hardness of particles [25,29]. As such, the hard ceramic allows an improvement in the hardness of novel composite, which in turn prevents fast surface deterioration, finally driving better wear resistance of the composites [30].…”