New method for preparing micron porous aluminium via powder metallurgy

ABSTRACT

In this work, micron porous aluminium (Al) specimens with various porosities were successfully prepared via a cold pressing-vacuum sintering-dissolution process (SDP) with water-soluble granules as space holders. Effects of the parameters of the sintering process on microstructure, density, and hardness were investigated. Results show that SDP was used to synthesise open-cell porous aluminium with uniform holes and enabled easy control of the microstructure porosity of porous aluminium. We also found that vacuum sintering and the addition of magnesium (Mg) improved the sintered behaviours. Based on our findings, the optimised sintering parameters (temperature and time) for porous aluminium are 650°C and 270 min, respectively.

KEYWORDS:

• Porous aluminium
• water-soluble granules
• microstructure
• porosity
• hardness
• sintering parameters

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Chao Liu http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0552-6672

Yang Liu http://orcid.org/0000-0003-2553-9515

Additional information

Funding

The research reported in this paper was financially supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (No. 61xxxx02) and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities of Central South University (No. 2016zzts031).