Microstructural and properties evaluation of A356 alloy/cow horn particulate composites produced by spark plasma sintering

ABSTRACT

The need to improve engineering properties, reduce weight and cost of composites led to this present study. A356 alloymatrix composites with varying ranges of cow horn particles, (0–25 wt%), were produced using spark plasma sintering machine. The relationships between sintering parameters as a function of temperature, holding time, pressure and heating rate were studied. After production, the percentage of densification, density, porosity, hardness values and compressive strength was investigated. The densification ranges from 98.13% to 94.23% at 0 and 25 wt% CHAp were obtained at 550 °C under 30 MPa pressure and 10 °C/min heating time. The good and better interfacial bonding between the alloy and the CHAp resulted in lower values of porosity and higher percentage of densification obtained. The A356 alloy reinforced with CHAp exhibits higher hardness values and compressive strength than the unreinforced A356 alloy.

KEYWORDS:

• Cow horn
• spark plasma sintering
• A356 alloy
• microstructure and properties

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.