Effect of Pouring Temperature on Microstructure and Properties of A356 Alloy Strip by a Novel Semisolid Micro Fused-Casting for Metal

A novel semisolid micro fused-casting (MFC) for preparing A356 alloy strips is proposed, and the effects of process parameters of pouring temperature on the microstructure and properties of A356 alloy strips are investigated. MFC means that the semisolid metal slurry was pressed out from the outlet of bottom of crucible to the movable plate, and directly solidified and formed layer by layer. The microstructure and properties of A356 semisolid alloy slurry were influenced by the cooling conditions. Results show that the aluminu alloy A356 strip samples fabricated by micro fused-casting had good performances and uniform structures with the pouring temperature at 595 degrees C and the substrate movement speed at 18 mm/s. The fine grains of the primary alpha-Al phase with average grain size of 53 mu m and shape factor up to 0.72 was obtained, the ultimate tensile strength of the aluminum alloy A356 strip reaches 243.79 +/- 3.91 MPa, while the average vickers hardness is 82.65 +/- 1.86 HV.