Combining effect of annealing and reinforcement content on mechanical behavior of multi-walled CNT reinforced AA5052 composites

Abstract

The large requirement of materials to enhance the overall performance of aerospace and automobile components focused the researchers on developing aluminum metal matrix composite (MMC) materials. This work deals with the fabrication of aluminum MMCs reinforcing with multi-walled carbon nanotubes (MWCNT) produced by a low-cost stir casting process. The tensile strength and micro-hardness tests were carried out to study the mechanical behavior of the composites. Moreover, the microstructural observation was also analysed with the help of FESEM and XRD analysis. The composites were subjected to annealing heat treatment process to investigate the mechanical strength. It was observed that with the reinforcement of CNT, the aluminum alloy composites exhibited superior mechanical properties as compared with the base alloy whereas annealing reduced the mechanical properties of the composites as compared to the as-casted condition for each composition of CNT content. Moreover, the tensile fractography was also characterized in terms of equiaxed dimples, CNT pull-out, matrix cracking on the fracture surfaces. � 2022