CHARACTERIZATION OF LIQUID-METAL INFILTRATION OF A CHOPPED FIBER PREFORM AIDED BY EXTERNAL-PRESSURE .3. MODEL VALIDATION AND QUANTIFICATION

In the present work experimental infiltration of Saffil chopped fibre preforms has been conducted to validate and quantify the theoretical m odel for squeeze pressurised liquid metal infiltration of chopped fibr e preforms developed by the present authors. The validation experiment shows that the established model is capable of predicting the hydrody namic features of the infiltration processing, but cannot be used dire ctly to instruct processing modification and optimisation due to the i nclusion of unconventional geometrical parameters of the preforms duri ng its establishment and the need for physicochemical properties of th e melt-fibre system that are not generally available. To endow the mod el with quantitative predictability, empirical infiltration of Saffil chopped fibre preforms of variable fibre volume fractions, prepared us ing identical chopped fibres and preforming process, have been conduct ed and the uncertainties in the model have been determined. The model shows quantitative consistence with the experimental findings. Copyrig ht (C) 1996 Acta Metallurgica Inc.