DEVELOPMENT AND PARAMETRIC INVESTIGATIONS OF NEAR-DRY WIRE ECDM PROCESS

Abstract

Over the past several decades, research in the field of material science has led to the development of advanced materials used in technologically advanced industries. These materials owned better mechanical, physical, chemical, and thermal properties. The development of the metal matrix composites (MMC’s) has significantly boosted the automobile and aerospace industries, owing to the high strength to weight ratio. The aluminum and its alloys have outstanding properties like lightweight, better wear and corrosion resistance, and better strength, making them suitable in numerous industrial applications. In both the aerospace and automobile industries, Al-based MMC’s are widely used for manufacturing different components. Many challenges are there in the fabrication of MMC’s. In MMC’s, the reinforcements (i.e., abrasive particles like SiC, Al2O3, WC, B4C, TiB2) were added to the metal matrix to enhance the properties. Challenges like non-uniform dispersion of the reinforced particles, agglomeration of the reinforced particles, and low wettability of the reinforced particles with the molten matrix cause weak matrix-reinforcement bonding are encountered during the fabrication of MMC’s. Porosity is also a major challenge in the fabrication of MMC’s. Generally, secondary operations such as rolling, extrusion, or forging to be done after the casting process to reduce the porosity. Therefore, there is a necessity to further investigate the primary processing of MMC’s in order to produce industrial components of good quality at a reasonable price.