Publication

Abstract : Investigation on effect of Zirconium Oxide reinforcement on Al7050 alloy was carried out. MMC was fabricated using liquid metallurgy technique with varying weight fraction of Zirconium oxide reinforcement particle from 0% to 10% in step of 2.5% and all other parameters were maintained constant. Reinforcement particle size used in fabricating the MMC was 5 ìm. Mechanical properties such as Tensile strength, Hardness and Impact strength were analyzed as per the ASTM standards. Microstructure study confirmed uniform distribution of reinforced particles. It was observed that Mechanical properties were enhanced with increasing wt% of reinforcement particle below 10%. At 10 wt% of reinforcement, clusters were observed in the MMC which in turn attributes to the reduction in the mechanical properties of the MMC. Results also showed that the % elongation decreases with increase in % of reinforcement. The Corrosion characteristic study showed improvement and was 0.96mpy for 10% wt of ZrO2 reinforcement as compared to the pure alloy of 3.941mpy. The corrosion rate increases with the increase in the % reinforcement as ZrO2 is denser and was uniformly dispersed in the metal matrix.