Quantitative evaluation on wear resistance of aluminum alloy composites densely packed with SiC particles

Wear behaviour was investigated for high volume fraction SiC particulate reinforced aluminum alloy composites by considering the shear stress acting on the specimen and the wear debris formed during sliding wear. The SEM morphology of worn subsurfaces showed that particles are fragmented, mechanically mixed, and then aligned in the wear direction caused by normal and tangential stresses. Wear debris were initially tiny lumps but finally delaminated due to the shear stress. A theoretical wear model was proposed for plastically deformable specimens worn by a rigid non-deformable steel ring by analysing the interspacing of SiC particles and the tangential stress applied to the worn surface. Predictions of this theoretical wear model were in good agreement with experimental results.