Microstructure and Properties of Spark Plasma Sintered Aluminum Containing 1 wt.% SiC Nanoparticles

Abstract

Abstract:The low hardness and strength of aluminum, which limits its use in many industrial applications, could be increased through the addition of nanoparticles. However, the appropriate processing method and parameters should be carefully selected in order to achieve the desired improvement in properties. In this work, aluminum was reinforced with low weight fraction (1 wt.%) of SiC nanoparticles and consolidated through spark plasma sintering. The effect of processing parameters on the densification, microstructure, and properties of the processed material was investigated. Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscope (FE-SEM) equipped with Energy Dispersive X-ray Spectroscopy (EDS) facility was used to characterize the microstructure and analyze the reinforcement's distribution in sintered samples. Phases present were characterized through X-ray diffraction (XRD). A densimeter and a digital microhardness tester were used to measure the density and hardness, respectively. Compressive tests were performed using universal testing machine. A fully dense Al-1 wt.% SiC sample was obtained. Analysis of density and hardness values showed that the influence of applied pressure was more pronounced than heating rate while the influence of sintering temperature was more significant than sintering time. Within the range of parameters used, the highest values of the characterized properties were obtained at a sintering temperature of 600 °C, sintering time of 10 min, pressure of 50 MPa, and heating rate of 200 °C/min. OPEN ACCESSMetals 2015, 5 71

Effect of Sintering Temperature and Reinforcement Concentration on the Tribological Behaviors of Hybrid Aluminum Matrix Nano Composite

“…The hardness value is attributed to higher density value. Similar studies were reported [30][31][32][33][34]. It was reported that increase in the sintering temperature reduces the amount of large pores and also reduce grain size indeed increases density.…”

First Scalable 18650 Aqueous-based Supercapacitors Using Hydrophobicity of Anti-corrosion Graphite Passivation Layer

“…The ratio between Al 2 O 3 and Al can be obtained from the XRD using the relative intensities of Al 2 O 3 peak at 2θ=15.9 o (Al 2 O 3 phase) 26 and Al peak at 2θ=38.2 o (111 plane). 27 The AC-Al shows a higher Al 2 O 3 content of about 14.6% as compared with that of the AC-GP, indicating the graphite layer can reduce the Al 2 O 3 lm formation. Note, the Al 2 O 3 lm spontaneously grows on the Al foil surface at atmospereic condition having humidity.…”

Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of AA7075 Aluminum Alloy Fabricated by Spark Plasma Sintering (SPS)

“…Powder metallurgy (PM) technology has been of interest to several industrial sectors for decades. The necessity for metallic materials with improved mechanical and physical properties to satisfy the current requirements has resulted in development of new manufacturing processes [ 1 , 2 ]. The AA7075 aluminum alloy is widely used in the aeronautical, marine, automotive and defense industries for its high mechanical strength to weight ratio [ 3 , 4 ], but is still the subject of several studies seeking to further improve its mechanical properties [ 5 ].…”

“…The manufacture of aluminum alloy parts commonly uses powder metallurgy processes, such as cold isostatic pressing (CIP), hot isostatic pressing (HIP), hot pressing (HP), hot extrusion and hot rolling. These are competitive with respect to casting and extrusion, but it involves the degassing of the powder for several hours and several more hours (1–5 h) at relatively high temperatures [ 6 , 7 ], which makes the process expensive [ 1 , 2 , 8 ]. Moreover, the long cycle time and high temperatures lead to the growth of the grains, to the detriment of the final properties.…”

“…The SPS technique involves applying a pulsed direct current simultaneously with uniaxial pressure, which allows one to reach high heating rates, performing sintering at relatively low temperatures for short sintering times and enabling the preparation of highly dense materials without the use of pre-compaction, binders (and degassing), in addition to providing materials with better properties according to the fine grain size of the matrix [ 2 , 15 , 16 , 17 , 18 , 19 ]. The success of the SPS is attributed, according to M. Tokita [ 20 ], to the role of the spark and plasma (confer the name of the technique) that are generated between the particles [ 21 , 22 ].…”