Wear behaviour of aluminium 7075-boron carbide-coconut shell fly ash reinforced hybrid metal matrix composites

The experimental work deals with wear behaviour of Aluminium7075 (Al7075) alloy with reinforcements of boron carbide (B4C) and coconut shell fly ash (CSFA) hybrid composites. The experimental research work is carried out in material ofAl7075 hybrid composite manufactured through stir casting. Wear specimen of Al7075 alloy hybrid composites are manufactured with varying weight percentage of (0, 3, 6, 9 and 12 wt%) B4C with 3 wt% CSFA composite. The research study involves dry sliding wear behaviour of Al7075 hybrid composites by pin-on-disc wear tester. The wear characteristics are evaluated using varying load of 10, 20, 30 and 40 N sliding velocities of 1.57, 3.14, and 4.71 m s(-1) with a constant 1000 m sliding distance. The reinforcement particles of B4C and CSFA increased the wear resistance of composites while compared to unreinforced aluminium alloy and aluminium-coconut shell fly ash reinforced composites. The hybrid composite contains B4C and CSFA reinforcement particles offered good improvement in the tribological properties. These experimental results exposed that the addition of hard reinforcements such as B4C and agro based waste material as a reinforcement of CSFA particles have greater improvement in wear resistance. The wear mechanism is studied using field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM).