Wear behaviour on ceramic particle reinforced aluminium matrix composites

Abstract

The present work deals with the wear behaviour on AA6061 based aluminium matrix composites reinforced with different kinds of ceramic particles: TiB 2, B4C, Si3N4, Al2O 3 y SiC. Composites were obtained by means of a solid-state consolidation method, combining both powder metallurgy processing and hot extrusion. The study carried out was based on a pin-on-ring apparatus under dry sliding conditions (dry friction). Both friction coefficient and wear rate were measured for each composite. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) was used to analyse wear and the tribolayer formed. Results show that wear rate is lower in composites than in the unreinforced alloy in every case, as expected. Differences among composites are probably related to different particle size rather than nature of reinforcements. On the other hand, friction coefficient do not show a trend on composites, being lower than the base alloy in some cases and higher in others.