Metallurgical Abstracts on Light Metals and Alloys vol. 58
Preparation, Microstructure, and Thermal Properties of Aluminum/Carbon Composites
Li-Fu YI1, Tetsuhiko ONDA1 and Zhong-Chun CHEN1
1 Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Graduate School of Engineering, Tottori University, Koyama-minami 4-101, Tottori 680-8552, Japan
[Published in Japan Society of Powder and Powder Metallurgy, Vol. 72 (2025), S1315-S1321]
https://doi.org/10.2497/jjspm.16D-T17-04
E-mail: chen[at]tottori-u.ac.jp
Key Words: Aluminum/carbon composites, Microstructure, Thermal conductivity, Coefficient of thermal expansion
Aluminum (Al)/carbon composites are considered to be promising thermal management materials. In this work, highly densed Al/graphite, Al/carbon fibers (CFs), and Al/graphite/CFs composites were successfully prepared by a hot extrusion process. Besides, small amounts of Al-Si alloy addition and Ni-coating were applied to improve the interfacial bonding between Al matrix and carbon in the composites. The microstructure, thermal conductivity (TC), and coefficient of thermal expansion (CTE) of the hot-extruded Al/carbon composites were investigated. The results showed that hot extrusion can lead to deformation of graphite and align the graphite and CFs along the extrusion direction. Al-Si alloy addition and Ni-coating can effectively improve the Al/carbon interfacial bonding, thus decreasing the interfacial thermal resistance. The Al/graphite composites showed relatively high TC and CTE values, while the Al/CFs composites exhibited relatively low TC and CTE values. In contrast, the Al/graphite/CFs hybrid composites presented an excellent balance between TC and CTE.
(a) Thermal conductivity and (b) coefficient of thermal expansion in the extrusion direction of 450°C-extruded Al/40vol% graphite samples as a function of Al-Si alloy content.