Grain Refinement of B319 Alloy Using Spark Plasma Sintered Al–Ti–C Grain Refiners

The B319 aluminum alloy is a candidate material for automotive applications, where engineers and material designers are seeking to improve vehicle efficiency through vehicle weight reduction. Although the alloy has many desirable properties, such as excellent castability and moderate strength-to-weight ratio, efforts to further enhance the alloy’s strength via the grain refinement approach play a key role to a wider adaptation of the alloy. However, there remain challenges related to the efficient dispersion of inoculating particles in the liquid alloy during casting. The present research has focused on examining the grain refining ability of various novel grain refiners produced via the spark plasma sintering powder metallurgy process. Two novel grain refiners [aluminum–titanium carbide (Al–TiC) and aluminum–titanium–carbon black (Al–Ti–Cb)] were produced at high and low concentrations and then added to the molten B319 alloy. The grain refiners got dispersed within the melt, thus overcoming the need for external melt stirring or treatment. The high concentration formulations for both Al–TiC and Al–Ti–Cb achieved a reduction in the average grain size by 31% and 25%, respectively.