Influence of the Mechanical Alloying Parameters on the Elaboration of Sic/Al Nanocomposite Powders

The paper presents the experimental work regarding the elaboration of some nanocomposite powders with higher SiC content. For the research, three types of mixtures were prepared: 90SiC-10Al, 70SiC-30Al and 60SiC-40Al using mechanical alloying (MA) technique. The MA was carried out in a vario planetary ball mill Pulverisette 4 for 5 hours using different conditions: - the shock mode (the main disk speed 400 rpm and the planets speed -800 rpm); - the friction mode (the main disk speed 400 rpm and the planets speed 800 rpm). The resulting mixtures was investigated by scanning electron microscopic (SEM), X-ray diffraction pattern (RDX), energy dispersive X-ray analysis (EDAX) and particle size distribution. After 5 hours of MA it is observed that the mixture obtained in the friction mode conditions have. a homogenous structure and the particle size distribution is better than the particle size distribution of the mixture obtained in the shock mode conditions.