The Effect of Cooling Rate on the Microstructure of A356 Aluminium Alloy
In this study a fast-cooling technology is employed for a cast iron mould to prepare cast A356 aluminium alloy by solidification of the molten metal. The cooling rate is achieved by pouring the molten alloy into a preheating permanent mould at different temperatures (25, 100, 200, 300 and 4000 C) for cast samples with 40 mm inside diameter and 200 mm height. The samples considered are analyzed by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), and EDS X-ray analysis (EDS). The effects of cooling rate on the morphology of α – aluminum and eutectic silicon of A356 alloy have been studied. The results showed that the dendritic structure of α-phase was broken and converted into a somewhat globular grain structure and the coarse acicular eutectic silicon trend to be broken and converted into short sticks or small rounded in other cases.
Keywords: A356 Aluminum alloy, Grain refinement, Cooling rate, SEM, EDS, Microstructure.
Citation: Maftah H. Alkathafi, Abdalfattah A. Khalil, Ayad O. Abdalla. “The Effect of Cooling Rate on the Microstructure of A356 Aluminium Alloy”. SVOA Materials Science &Technology, 2020, 2(04): 91-99.
