Impact of Post Hardening Mechanism on Self-Healing Assessment of AA2014 Nitinol-Based Smart Composites

Exploring the self-healing capability in a metallic system, an experimental study was carried out for AA2014 and Nitinol-based smart composites material. The damage produced through the flexural test was healed by thermal heat treatment through compositional healing. The objective of this work is to enhance the recovery in self-healing assessment through different hardening processes. Strengthening model (solution hardening and age hardening) as a strength enhancement is employed on the healed samples (i.e. after heat treatment) to evaluate its effect and impact on different healing assessments. Further, XRD analysis was performed to explain how the developed residual stress in the microstructure is responsible in affecting the healing characteristics after each heat treatment processes. The obtained result show about 81.66% recovery in crack depth, 23.92% recovery in ductility, 84.3% recovery in crack width and 27.8% recovery in flexural strength after ageing. Graphic

Automated summary

This study explores the self-healing capability in a metallic system through experimental research, using thermal heat treatment to repair damage caused by flexural testing, and employing strengthening processes to enhance recovery in self-healing assessments. XRD analysis was conducted to explain how residual stress in the microstructure affects the healing characteristics after heat treatment.