Microstructural and mechanical properties of a novel Al-based hybrid composite reinforced with metallic glass and ceramic particles

A new type of Fe-based metallic glass (FMG) and SiC reinforced hybrid composite was successfully developed. The current work was set to evaluate the microstructure and mechanical properties of the hybrid composite consolidated through the spark plasma sintering (SPS) process. The densities of the samples were determined in order to examine the performance of the sintering process. The experimental results indicated that, in the composites having larger amounts of FMG particles, the reinforcements/matrix interfaces were free from any discontinuities. The quantitative analysis of microstructural features revealed that the more homogenous distribution of reinforcing particles was occurred for FMG rich composites. The microstructural analysis of the samples pointed that the amorphous structure of the FMG reinforcement remained unchanged and no interfacial chemical products were created in the consolidated samples. It was also found that using FMG along with SiC particles in the samples led to the more strengthening of the Al matrix compared to using just one type of reinforcement particles. In the current study, the hybrid composite reinforced with 7 vol% of FMG and 3 vol% of SiC particles demonstrated the optimum combination of compressive yield strength (98 MPa) and strain to fracture (62.8%). The strengthening mechanisms in all the consolidated samples were calculated quantitatively considering the load bearing of reinforcing particles, grain boundary and strain hardening mechanisms. The strain hardening with the contribution of about 30% in the yield strength was the predominant strengthening mechanism in the composite samples. Also, there was a reasonable agreement between the calculated and experimentally obtained yield strength for hybrid composite samples.