Mechanical and wear behaviour of hybrid AA8011 metal matrix composite reinforced with aluminum silicate and titanium dioxide

Abstract AA8011 aluminum-based metal matrix composite is fabricated with ceramic-reinforced particles such as titanium dioxide and aluminum silicate. The weight percentage of titanium oxide was varied from 0 to 15 with an increment of 3 wt.%. The other reinforcement element, aluminum silicate, was kept constant at 6 wt.%. The metal matrix composite was fabricated using the stir casting process. From the experimental results, the hybrid composite fabricated with 6 wt.% aluminum silicate and 9 % titanium oxide exhibited a higher strength of 132 MPa. The strength of the hybrid composite increased as the weight percentage of reinforcement particles increased from 3 to 9 wt.%. The porosity and density of the hybrid metal matrix increased while increasing the weight percentage of reinforcement from 3 to 15 wt.%. The maximum hardness of 97VHN was observed at the maximum percentage of reinforcement. This may be attributed to the addition of reinforcement in AA8011 aluminum alloy. A low wear rate of 4.72 × 10 −7 was recorded with 6 wt.% aluminum silicate and 15 wt.% titanium oxide. The reason for the lower wear rate may be attributed to the uniform distribution of reinforcement particles in the matrix.