IJSRST173726 | Received : 14 Sep 2017 | Accepted : 29 Sep 2017 | September-October-2017 [(3) 7: 363-369]
© 2017 IJSRST | Volume 3 | Issue 7 | Print ISSN: 2395-6011 | Online ISSN: 2395-602X
Themed Section: Science and Technology
363
Study of Wear Properties of SiC Particulate And E-Glass Fiber Reinforced Al
3003 Hybrid Metal Matrix Composites
1
Lakshmi Narayana K S,
2
Dr. H K Shivanand
1
PhD Scholar, VTU-RRC, Belagavi, Karnataka, India
2
Associate Professor, Dept. of Mechanical Engineering, UVCE, Bangalore, Karnataka, India
ABSTRACT
Composite materials play a vital role at the present modern industrial sectors. Metal matrix composites are light
weighted, high strength, extremely hard materials which are useful in various industrial areas like aerospace,
automotive, machine building due to their advantageous properties like light weight, flexibility, hardness, simplicity
and easy applicability and so on. At the centre of research and growth of these sectors this paper emphasizes the
production of metal-matrix Al-SiC & E-Glass composites using the stir-casting method with varying percentile
compositions of SiC & E-Glass with aluminium. In the present investigation a study on wear behavior of
Aluminium metal matrix composite reinforced with SiC and E-Glass (produced by stir casting process) has been
carried out. In this study wear performance is carried out by varying the percentage of reinforcements in the matrix.
All experiments were conducted under room temperature condition. To assess the wear characteristics of aluminium
alloy 3003 with SiC & E-Glass a computerized pin-on-disc machine was used. The specimen was studied under
scanning electron microscope to get an idea about the distribution of pattern of the reinforcement in the matrix alloy
and effect of these reinforcements on the wear behavior of the composites. Dispersion of reinforcements in the
aluminium matrix improves the wear behavior of the composites.
Keywords: E-Glass Fiber, Silicon Carbide, Aluminium 3003 Alloy, Stir Casting.
I. INTRODUCTION
Metal Matrix composites (MMCs) are made of a
continuous metallic matrix and one or more
discontinuous reinforcing phases. The reinforcing phase
may be in the form of fibers, whiskers or particles. In
particular, Particle-reinforced aluminium alloys have the
potential to be used in the wide range of engineering
applications due to their higher stiffness and strength
when compared with conventional aluminum alloys. For
these composite materials, Silicon Carbide (SiC), a
commercially pure material, has become the main type
of reinforcement. Most of the research work carried out
on aluminium based composite materials involved in
silicon carbide as its reinforcing material. Hence forth it
is essential to look for the possibilities of fabricating
aluminium based composite materials using alternative
materials such as E-Glass.
Metal matrix composites are produced economically by
stir casting techniques, with substantial increase in the
stiffness, hardness and strength to weight ratio of cast
MMCs; but however there is a reduction in ductility. It
has been observed that some improvements in strength
and ductility can be achieved with the application of
plastic forming processes i.e. forging of the cast
composites. The forged MMCs in general have better
mechanical properties compared to cast MMCs, such as
improved density, hardness and tensile strength etc. The
forging process also avoids the use of secondary
operation like machining.
II. METHODS AND MATERIAL
EXPERIMENTATION
A. MATERIALS
Reinforcement compositions are selected based on the
previous work done by many researchers. In many
literatures authors have mentioned the reinforcement
percentage should be less than 10% for E-Glass and 2%