Forgeability and Machinability of Stir Cast Aluminum Alloy Metal Matrix Composites

In the present paper, the aluminum alloy i.e. LM6 based composites reinforced with different weight fraction of SiC particles was produced by stir cast technique and the effect of reinforced ratios on the forgeability and the machinability was examined. The test results show that the increment in weight fraction of reinforcement particles in the matrix metal produced better mechanical property like hardness but the forgeability of the cast MMCs decreases. The forgeability of the as cast MMCs were also varied with the change in thickness of the casting. The results show that the forgeability of cast metal matrix composites at the mid section of the casting is minimum compared to both end section of a three-step casting. The effect of machining parameters, e.g. cutting speed and depth of cut on the surface roughness and cutting forces at constant feed rate was investigated during experimentation. The results show that higher weight percentage of SiCp reinforcement produced a higher surface roughness and needs higher cutting forces during machining operation. It has also observed that the depth of cut and the cutting speed at constant feed rate affected the surface roughness and the cutting forces. This practical research analysis and test results on the forgeability and machinability of Al/SiC-MMC will provide useful guidelines to the present day manufacturing engineers.

Experimental Investigation on the Effect of Reinforcement Particles on the Forgeability and the Mechanical Properties of Aluminum Metal Matrix Composites

The wide choice of materials, today’s engineers are posed with a big challenge for the right selection of a material and as well as the right selection of a manufacturing process for an application. Aluminium Metal Matrix Composites is a relatively new material among all the engineering materials. It has proved its position in automobile, aerospace, and many other engineering applications due its wear resistance properties and due to its substantial hardness. One of the most important criteria is forgeability by which the workability of the material can be determined. The nature of distribution of reinforcing phase in the matrix greatly influenced the properties of Aluminum Metal Matrix Composites. The forgeability of Aluminum Metal Matrix Composites, which are produced by powder metallurgy method, are greatly depends on the size and percentage of reinforcement materials, compacting load, sintering temperature and soaking time etc. In this present work, the forgeability of Aluminum Metal Matrix Composites reinforced with silicon carbide (400 meshes) has investigated. A comparison have been made with different types of Aluminum Silicon Carbide Metal Matrix Composite materials contains 0%5%,10%,15%&20% by weight of silicon carbide. The mechanical properties like hardness of the different composites have also investigated. It is observed that the forgeabilty of the composites decreases with increasing the wt% of SiC but the mechanical properties like hardness enhanced on increasing the wt% of SiC.