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Inoculation Treatment of an Additively Manufactured 2024 Aluminium Alloy with Titanium Nanoparticles

38 Pages Posted: 18 May 2020 Publication Status: Accepted

See all articles by Qiyang Tan

Qiyang Tan

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Jingqi Zhang

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Qiang Sun

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Zhiqi Fan

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Gan Li

Southern University of Science and Technology - Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Additive Manufacturing of High-Performance Materials; University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Yu Yin

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Yingang Liu

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Ming-Xing Zhang

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

Abstract

Considerable studies on metal selective laser melting (SLM) have proved the necessity to refine microstructure parts fabricated by SLM in order to eliminate property anisotropy, hot-tearing and to increase the SLM-processability. In the present work, Ti nanoparticles, at the first time, were discovered to be an extremely effective inoculant for an SLMed 2024 aluminium alloy. 0.7 wt.% addition of Ti nanoparticles was capable of substantially eliminating the hot-tearing cracks and columnar structure, and refining the grains in the SLMed 2024 alloy in a broad processing window. The substantial grain refinement in the Ti-inoculated 2024 alloy was attributed to the in-situ formation of Al3Ti nanoparticles with a L12 ordered structure, which formed a coherent interface with Al matrix and therefore significantly promoted the heterogeneous nucleation of the α-Al during solidification of melt pools in the SLM process. After a conventional T6 heat treatment, this SLMed alloy exhibited a superior balance of strength and ductility (tensile strength was up to 432 ± 20 MPa and elongation of 10 ± 0.8%), which was comparable to its wrought counterpart. This work can be considered as a breakthrough in research of fabricating high-strength aluminium alloys using SLM.

Keywords: Selective laser melting, 2024 aluminium alloys, Grain refinement, EBSD, TEM

Suggested Citation

Tan, Qiyang and Zhang, Jingqi and Sun, Qiang and Fan, Zhiqi and Li, Gan and Yin, Yu and Liu, Yingang and Zhang, Ming-Xing, Inoculation Treatment of an Additively Manufactured 2024 Aluminium Alloy with Titanium Nanoparticles. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3592041 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3592041

Qiyang Tan

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Jingqi Zhang

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering ( email )

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Qiang Sun

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Zhiqi Fan

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering ( email )

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Gan Li

Southern University of Science and Technology - Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Additive Manufacturing of High-Performance Materials

No 1088, xueyuan Rd.
Xili, Nanshan District
Shenzhen, Guangdong 518055
China

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Yu Yin

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Yingang Liu

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering ( email )

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

Ming-Xing Zhang (Contact Author)

University of Queensland - School of Mechanical and Mining Engineering ( email )

St Lucia
Brisbane, Queensland 4072
Australia

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