Effects of amounts of blowing agent and contained gases on porosity and pore structure of porous aluminum fabricated from aluminum alloy die casting by friction stir processing route

Abstract

Porous aluminum is expected to be applied as a multifunctional material in various industrial fields because of its light weight and high energy absorption. When aluminum alloy die castings are used as a starting material in the fabrication of porous aluminum, it can be expected that, by effectively using the gases intrinsically contained in the die casting to generate pores, porous aluminum can be fabricated by adding a small amount of blowing agent. In this study, while systematically varying the amount of blowing agent from 0 to 1.4mass% that is added to ADCl2 aluminum alloy die castings containing three different amounts of gases, porous aluminum is fabricated by the FSP (friction stir processing) route precursor method. Titanium(II) hydride powder is used as the blowing agent. The variations of porosity and pore structure with the amount of added blowing agent are investigated for each amount of gases contained in the die castings. On the basis of the results, it is shown that, by using a blowing agent of approximately 0.6mass%, ADCl2 porous aluminum with high porosity can be fabricated regardless of the amount of gases contained in the die casting. © 2011 The Japan Institute of Metals.