FABRICATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF METAL MATRIX COMPOSITES FROM AL6063, GRAPHITE AND CENOSPHERE

Sachin Prabha, Shivasharanaya Swamy, Manjunatha.L.H, Veerbhadrappa.T

Abstract: The advantageous properties like wear, hardness, toughness, etc has bought a great fame to the composite materials as a major engineering material. Aluminium has been used in various applications of automobile and aerospace industries since ages, Hence Aluminium of different grades are been used in the manufacturing of many metal matrix composites with varying composition of the reinforcement. Focusing on the various advantages and applications of Aluminum this project uses Aluminium 6063 as a matrix material with Graphite and Cenosphere as the reinforcement materials. Cenosphere being light weighted material due to its less density stir casting method has been used in casting of composites. Composite specimens are prepared as per ASTM standards. For obtaining the better mechanical properties the machined composite material are subjected to the hardening process using the method of quenching. Two different quenching techniques like water and ice quenching are been adopted in the project. Testing like compression, shear, wear, and hardness are carried out for each set of specimens in order to know the mechanical properties of the prepared composite material. In order to know the uniform distribution of the reinforcements test like SEM is carried out. Finally all the obtained mechanical properties are studied and tabulated.

Keywords: Al6063, Graphite, Cenosphere, Stir casting.

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15623/ijret.2016.0533002