Surface modification of Al-15Al2O3-0.3G powder metallurgical alloy induced by high-current pulsed electron beam

This paper investigates the effect of high-current pulsed electron beam (HCPEB) surface treatment with two, five, and eight pulses on Al-15Al2O3-0.3G prepared by powder metallurgy. The results show that the presence of graphene during HCPEB irradiation effectively controls the extension of microcracks. The surface hardness of the samples increased by 66.56% and the wear rate decreased by 68.98% after eight-pulse HCPEB treatment. The increase in hardness is attributed to the uniform dispersion of hard particles, fine grain strengthening, dislocation strengthening, and amorphous structure formation by XRD, SEM, and TEM analysis during HCPEB irradiation. The improvement in wear resistance was attributed to the increase in hardness. The corrosion current density in 5 wt. % NaCl solution decreased from 1.212 × 10−4 to 3.353 × 10−5 after eight-pulse HCPEB treatment; the improved corrosion resistance performance is attributed to the equilibrium structure induced by HCPEB treatment.