Effect of Calcium Addition on the Aluminum Alloy A201 Foam

Abstract

To study the effect of calcium on the porosity, sphericity, and microstructure of Al‐Cu foams, a gradient calcium content (0.5, 1.0, 1.5, and 2.0 wt%) was added into aluminum A201 alloy (Al‐Cu alloy) for the cellular aluminum foam preparation via the melt foaming method (TiH2 was used as a bubbling agent). Thereafter, the porosity of the prepared Al foams and their pore size were found to increase, and the sphericity of pores tended to approach to unit with calcium addition. This phenomenon was then explained through the modified thermophysical properties (i.e., surface tension and viscosity) of A201 alloy melts caused by the calcium addition. After the microstructure analysis, a bunch of secondary phases in the A201+Ca alloy foams, e.g., CalAl2Si2, Al2Cu, and Al20CaTi2 as well as an eutectic phase with a great copper content Al8CaCu4 were detected by means of SEM/EDX and XRD.This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.