Interfacial modification and performance enhancement of carbon matrix/aluminum composites

Carbon/Aluminum (C/Al) composites are receiving great attentions because they can present both good mechanical and electrical performance while keeping lightweight. However, the non-wettability of carbon and aluminum as well as the avoidable formation of the brittle phase Al4C3 can lead to a weak adhesion interface, limiting the performance improvement of the composites. In this work, an interlayer of silicon carbide and aluminum-silicon alloy the silicon was constructed at the interfaces of carbon matrix and aluminum, in order to resolve the bottleneck problem of composites performance improvement. Results indicated that the wettability of carbon matrix and aluminum melt was significantly improved by the constructed interlayer, and the contact angle decreased from 91 degrees to 41 degrees. Optimized parameters for the formation of moderate interlayer were also systematically examined. The interface of C/Al composites was changed from C/Al4C3/Al to C/SiC/Al-Si, resulting in the improvement of compressive strength, flexural strength and electrical conductivity from 212.75 MPa, 94.95 MPa, 2.25 x 10(5) S/m to 362.24 MPa, 144.42 MPa, 4.03 x 10(5) S/m, respectively, far better than the requirement of industrial standard. Mechanisms for the performance enhancement are also discussed. (C) 2022 Published by Elsevier B.V.