Effect of ceramic particles on cell size and wall thickness of aluminum foam

A process of foaming aluminum alloy melt by air was conducted to study the effect of SiC and Al2O3 particles on cell size and wall thickness of aluminum foam. The effects of size and concentration of the ceramic particles were investigated at various foaming temperatures and airflow rates. The results show that the cell size and wall thickness increase with increasing SiC and Al2O3 particle size and concentration at constant foaming temperature, and the cell wall thickness decreases with increasing foaming temperature. It was found that stable foam does not occur until a critical particle concentration is reached for some of the SiC and Al2O3 particles, while the excessive addition of the particles leads to unstable foaming. Therefore, a range of the particle concentration is critical for stable foaming of the composite slurry at the foaming temperatures.