The Effect of Controlled Melt-Solidification on the Strain Rate Sensitivity of a Squeeze-Cast Hybrid-Reinforced Aluminum AA 6061 Matrix Composite

Abstract

A framework based on the relationship between variations in cooling rates and volume fraction of reinforcements during solidification processing to enhance the deformation behavior of aluminum alloy AA6061 matrix composite produced with a hybrid system of reinforcements is investigated in this study. The aluminum matrix composite with 5 %, 10 % and 20 % volume fraction of reinforcements (Al2O3-SiC) was synthesized by infiltrating molten aluminum AA 6061 at a pouring temperature of 740 °C into prefabricated preforms of reinforcements at a pressure of 80 MPa, die preheat temperature of 300 °C and pressure holding time of 15 s using the squeeze casting method. By employing water jet spraying at the rate of 0.1, 0.2 and 0.3 kg/s and taking measurements using a K-type thermocouple, cooling rates were obtained in correspondence with varying volume fractions of reinforcements. The developed composites were sectioned and microstructural features were examined by optical microscopy. Tensile testing was conducted according to ASTM B557 standard using an MTS testing machine. It was observed that cooling rates decreased as the volume fraction of reinforcements was increased and the cooling time also increased accordingly during this process. With respect to deformation behavior, higher cooling rates are associated with an improvement in mechanical properties at 5 % and 10 % additions of hybrid reinforcement particles but this effect diminishes as the volume fraction of reinforcements was increased to 20 %. Also, the strain rate sensitivity (SRS) exponent increased considerably with strain rates and volume fraction of reinforcements, but the tensile elongation values decreased with increasing volume fraction of reinforcements; and the variations in these properties were most significant for samples containing 20% volume fraction of hybrid reinforcements.From the foregoing, it follows that an experimentally-determined optimal solidification range is critical to the enhancement of deformation parameters as the volume fraction of reinforcements is varied in a squeeze casting process.