Development and Characterization of Sustainable Particles Reinforced AA-7075 Hybrid Metal Matrix Composites

The processing of metallic materials alone has a huge impact on resource utilization, emission, and waste generation. With the emergent ecological concerns, there is a solid thrust towards sustainable materials development. Sustainable metal matrix composites are designed to minimize environmental impacts by reducing resource consumption and energy usage and curbing waste generation. Now a days, the automotive sector is making significant strides towards a more ecological product chain by adopting sustainable reinforcements such as basalt fibres, red mud reinforcements, fly ash, cenosphere particles etc. into matrix material which significantly influence the mechanical properties. With this perspective, the present work is aimed to investigate the hardness, tensile, flexural, impact and wear characteristics of 7075 reinforced with different combinations of B4C, egg shell particles along with fly ash. The results revealed that the best mechanical and wear are measured at 3 % boron carbide, 3 % Egg shell powder and 2 % fly ash reinforced AA-7075 composite among the other developed composites. The results thus suggested that the incorporation of sustainable reinforcements along with ceramic reinforcements offer enhanced material characteristics, cost savings and environmental advantages.