Fabrication and investigation of influence of CaCO3 as foaming agent on Al-SiCp foam

Abstract

ABSTRACTClosed cell aluminum foams have been used in various disciplines of engineering. Aluminum foams provide high strength with the advantage of low weight. In the current research, CaCO3 is used as a foaming agent for producing closed-cell aluminum foams. For the fabrication of homogenous foam, optimization of process parameters was done. The effect of SiC as a thickening agent on structural property of foams viz. density and porosity have been inspected. Foams with density 0.40–0.86 g/cm3 were produced. The produced foams were studied under axial compression tests for evaluating mechanical properties. It can be inferred from the results that by adding 3 wt.% CaCO3, the uniform viscosity of melt was achieved and a homogeneous foam structure is achieved with optimum porosity. Also, 5 wt.% addition of CaCO3 in melt and stirring speed at 1400 rpm tend to increase porosity and decrease cell wall thickness. The optimum values for thickening agent SiC, foaming agent CaCO3 at stirring speed 1400 rpm were found out to be 15 wt.%, 3 wt.%. The effect of relative density, the addition of thickening and foaming agent is studied.