Consolidated Al/Al2O3 Nanocomposites by Equal Channel Angular Pressing and Hot Extrusion

This work is aimed at producing Al-matrix nanocomposites through the powder metallurgy (PM) process. An initial study on pure aluminum powder was performed to analyze the performance of different PM techniques. In particular, Al powder was refined via high-energy ball milling and consolidated by hot extrusion and equal channel angular pressing. The latter revealed to be a very efficient procedure for powder compaction (high density and hardness of the products) and it was adopted for the production of Al-based composites reinforced with 2% and 5 wt% of Al2O3 nanoparticles. The composites exhibited higher hardness than the pure aluminum sample.