Characteristics of heat treated Al7Si-Mg-Zn - 5 wt.% SiC squeeze casted composite with variation of mg content for tactical vehicle application

Composite as main materials for ballistic applications has been developed in order to reduce density which leads to lower fuel consumption and easier mobilization. Composite is required to own high hardness and high impact strength for good ballistic performance. Particulate composites Al-7Si-Mg-Zn reinforced by SiC is designed for ballistic applications due to its light weight and high hardness. Whilst the high hardness showed brittle properties, heat treatment process is applied to this composite to reduce it. This research aims to study the effect of magnesium as alloying element to composite Al-7Si-Mg-Zn reinforced by SiC particulate which applied to precipitation hardening. Composites Al-7Si-Zn-SiC with 2, 4 and 6 wt. % Mg is solution treated at 500°C for 1 hour, followed by ageing at 200°C. The characterization was carried out by hardness testing, microstructure observations, SEM and EDX observations, impact testing and fractographic observations. Results showed that Mg does not affect hardness of composite by precipitation hardening. Composite with 2, 4, 6 wt. % Mg had 63.83, 62.27, 62.48 HRB on its peak hardness. Mg did not become precipitate in matrix Al-7Si-Mg-Zn because of its low diffusivity in aluminium. Mg worked as wetting agent that reduces interface tension between aluminium matrix and SiC particles in order for composite to own better interface bonding. Therefore impact testing showed significant increase of impact strength with the increase of Mg content. Composite with 2, 4, 6 wt. % Mg had 2075, 3006, 3257 J/mm2 impact strength respectively.