PHENOMENON OF WEAR IN METAL MATRIX COMPOSITES

Abstract

Combining high specific strength with good corrosion resistance, metal matrix composites (MMCs) are materials that are attractive for a large range of engineering applications. But lack of sufficient data about the tribological characteristics of MMC is one of the reasons which limit its wide use in engineering field. In this study, the tribological behaviour of Al 6063-SiCp MMC, subjected to dry and lubricated sliding condition using a pin-on-disc setup have been analysed and explained. Investigation was carried out by varying the process parameters such as applied load, sliding distance, sliding velocity and reinforcement size to study its effect on wear loss and coefficient of friction (COF). The effect of each process parameters and their interactions on wear loss and COF were analysed using Response surface methodology (RSM). The analysis reveals that under dry wear condition all the five process parameters have significant effect on wear loss but for COF applied load and sliding velocity have significant effect. In case of lubricated wear test, wear loss is significantly affected by sliding distance and velocity whereas COF is effected by load and sliding distance and sliding velocity. This observations can be used to analyse the tribological performance of MMCs subjected to similar operating conditions