Alloy design of thixoformable wrought SiC/Al alloy composites

One of the major issues in fabricating Al alloy composites reinforced with SiC particulates is to avoid interfacial reaction products, i.e., Al4C3 and Si. The formation of such interfacial reaction products can be suppressed by the presence of an adequate amount of Si within the matrix of the compos ites. The equilibrium Si contents required to prevent the interfacial react ion in various SiCp/wrought Al composites were predicted both using theoret ical calculations and experiments. Application of these results for designi ng the matrix alloy and selecting process parameters for the semi-solid for ming was demonstrated. (C) 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd.