Microstructure and mechanical properties of Al 5083 alloy produced by rapid solidification

The structure of metals strongly depends on solidification parameters such as cooling rate and supercooling. It is obvious that the cooling rate is an important factor in order to refine metal structure, and especially affecting mechanical properties of metals. In this investigation melt spinning method is used to reach rapid solidification and ribbon shaped samples in Aluminum 5083 alloy were produced. The resulting ribbon samples were studied by optical microscopy (OM), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), micro hardness tester, X-ray difractometry, and were compared with their ingot counterparts. The results perfectly shown that the produced ribbons exhibits unique properties such as enhanced solid-solubility level of elements in the Al matrix (solid solution strengthening) and formation of spherically shaped intermetallic phases rich in Fe, Mn and Si and less than 50 nm in size homogenously dispersed in Al matrix which resulted in mechanical properties improvement and microstructural refinement of Al5083 alloy. As an example microhardness was approximately raised over 2 times more than conventional casting methods.