Effect of Load on Wear and Friction of AlSi/MWCNT Functionally Graded Material Via Powder Metallurgy with Hot Extrusion Technique

Due to the superior mechanical and thermal properties of nanomaterials like multi-walled carbon nanotubes, aluminum alloys containing them play a significant role in the aerospace and automotive industries. By incorporating multi-walled carbon nanotubes by weight percentage of (0, 0.25, 0.50, and 0.75) in Aluminum silicon alloy. proper dispersion is done using ball milling equipment to get the proper bonding between Aluminium silicon alloy with MWCNT then subsequently powder metallurgy followed by extrusion technique. Wear study is carried out by varying load by 20N to 40N by maintaining sliding distance constant at 1000m and speed at 3.14m/sec. Wear test indicates for 20N load that wear rate is reduced by 46% for 2-layer FGM compared to AlSi-0.5WT% MWCNT, AlSi-0.25WT% MWCNT and 10% reduction in wear rate compared to AlSi-0.75WT% MWCNT. In case of 40N, wear rate is decreased by 162% for 2-layer when compared with AlSi-0.25WT% MWCNT and by 91% when compared to AlSi-0.5WT% MWCNT. As the percentage of MWCNT increases leads to decrease in wear rate in case of 20N & 40N load for 2-layer FGM compared to nanocomposites. Optical microscopy is done to reveal the proper bonding of AlSi with MWCNT. SEM analysis is carried out to determine wear mechanism.