A SCALING UP STUDY OF QUASICRYSTALLINE NANOCOMPOSITES

M GALANO; S PEDRAZZINI; N ROUNTHWAITE; F AUDEBERT; M LIEBLICH; A GARCIA ESCORIAL; G. SMITH

Simposio; Ismanam 2010; 2010

Different Al based nanoquascrystalline alloys have been developed in the recent years with a microstructure containing nanoquasicrystalline phases embedded in an FCC-Al matrix. Several works done by the authors have shown that the additions of Ti and Nb increased the stability of the quasicrystalline phase delaying the microstructural transformation to higher temperatures. In addition, it has been observed that these alloys systems maintain a high strength at elevated temperatures making them a promising candidate for industrial applications. However, these alloys were unable to be taken further into industry due to the unavailability of scaling up the manufacturing processes without hindering their mechanical behaviour. In this work nanoquasicrystalline alloys were obtained through manufacturing processes scalable up to a near industrial scale followed by a thorough analysis of the microstructure and mechanical properties. In addition to the pure nanoquasicrystalline alloys, nanocomposites were obtained by the addition of pure Aluminium particles. Industrial applications in the automotive and aerospace sectors require the study of different aspects of the mechanical properties therefore tensile, compression and microhardness tests were done at room and elevated temperatures. In addition Hopkinsons bar test measurements at high strain rates were obtained. The mechanical properties behaviour is correlated with the microstructural analysis, which was carried out using SEM, with EBSD, EDX and TEM. Different aspects of the manufacturing processes and microstructural characteristics as oxide particles and grain sizes were analysed carefully achieving the balance needed to allow the scalability to near industrial scale without compromising the mechanical behaviour making these alloys and composites directly transferable to industry.