Strategic process optimisation for tribological behaviour of silica gel reinforced aluminium composite material by neuro-grey modelling

Abstract

Rotating and reciprocating parts requires low friction and high wear resistance for better life. Material like aluminium and its alloys, used largely in manufacturing/automotive sector, has the disadvantage of poor mechanical and tribological properties. In order to enhance the same the usage of aluminium-silicon composites are being rapid increased. In this work, silica gel reinforced aluminium composite was prepared to examine the tribological behavior. Plan of experiment was developed on the basis of three levels and three factors with Taguchi method initially. Proposed multi-objective optimisation problem was solved by neuro-grey modelling by using design including multiple attributes characterisation. The combined approach of ANN and GRA successfully overcomes the limitations of each other and provides with better solution. Experimental results show the efficacy of using such heuristics to highlight tribological properties of composite materials and any decision maker may opt for such strategy to make their operations more efficient.