Production and Wear Properties Evaluation of Al(6061)/CNT Nanocomposit

In this investigation mechanical alloying was used for dispersing different contents (2 and 5 wt%) of carbon nanotube (CNT) in the Al alloy (6061) powder particles. The distribution of CNTs in aluminum powder was investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive spectrometry (EDS). The size distribution of different powder mixture was evaluated by laser particle size analyzer (LPS) and the effect of milling process parameters on particle size distribution was quantified. The wear properties of bulk samples produced by hot extrusion were studied and simulated by related equations. It was concluded that the homogeneous distribution of CNTs in flattened Al powder particles could be achieved by 4h milling of Al-5 wt% CNT powder. Further milling resulted in equiaxed aluminum particles that contained embedded CNT particles. LPS results showed that the average particle size (D50) and the extension of size distribution (D90-D10) decreased during milling by increasing milling time and decreasing CNTs content. Compared with the wear properties of Al without CNTs, the results show the wear properties of Al-2 wt% CNT and Al-5 wt% CNT have increased 32% and 38% respectively. Also the simulation results of wear behavior as distance have a good agreement with experimental results.