Author Topic: Metalurgical Breakthrough: New Aluminium Alloy Nearly as Strong As Steel  (Read 2272 times)

Offline Stormbringer

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https://phys.org/news/2018-01-yields-super-strong-aluminum-alloy.html

The article says this is "comparable" to Stainless steel. Later in the body of the article it says nearly as strong as high strength steel.
So I was thinking since this is more of a structural breakthrough than a magic mix of metals perhaps similar techniques could be applied to titanium or steel or tungsten or even compound alloys to enhance their strength and melting or de-tempering temperature.

As is the benefits of having aluminum as strong as steel are evident enough in space applications.
« Last Edit: 01/29/2018 01:40 am by Stormbringer »
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Offline stefan r

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https://phys.org/news/2018-01-yields-super-strong-aluminum-alloy.html

The article says this is "comparable" to Stainless steel. Later in the body of the article it says nearly as strong as high strength steel.
So I was thinking since this is more of a structural breakthrough than a magic mix of metals perhaps similar techniques could be applied to titanium or steel or tungsten or even compound alloys to enhance their strength and melting or de-tempering temperature.

As is the benefits of having aluminum as strong as steel are evident enough in space applications.

There is already a lot of engineering in steel crystal growth.  Pig iron gets worked a lot before it becomes steel.

I am not certain but I would highly suspect their new aluminum would have a lower melting temperature and lower fracture toughness.  High strength aluminum could be very useful for a lot of applications. 

Offline Athrithalix

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From a quick reading of that, it sounds like they've only made incredibly thin films of it so far. For useful aerospace applications you would need thicker sections, and it sounds like their technique for making it wouldn't be immediately transferable to something that isn't a film.

Offline Robotbeat

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Every article that says something has "x" property but doesn't actually use a number with well-defined units (i.e. for strength: GPa, ksi) should be deleted.
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Offline Robotbeat

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Here's the abstract with the relevant sentence bolded. Shame on phys.org for not actually using a number.
actual published article
Quote
Abstract

Light-weight aluminum (Al) alloys have widespread applications. However, most Al alloys have inherently low mechanical strength. Nanotwins can induce high strength and ductility in metallic materials. Yet, introducing high-density growth twins into Al remains difficult due to its ultrahigh stacking-fault energy. In this study, it is shown that incorporating merely several atomic percent of Fe solutes into Al enables the formation of nanotwinned (nt) columnar grains with high-density 9R phase in Al(Fe) solid solutions. The nt Al–Fe alloy coatings reach a maximum hardness of ≈5.5 GPa, one of the strongest binary Al alloys ever created. In situ uniaxial compressions show that the nt Al–Fe alloys populated with 9R phase have flow stress exceeding 1.5 GPa, comparable to high-strength steels. Molecular dynamics simulations reveal that high strength and hardening ability of Al–Fe alloys arise mainly from the high-density 9R phase and nanoscale grain sizes.

They don't give the actual density of the alloy in the abstract, so it's hard to say if it's actually better than good steel on a specific strength basis (i.e. Strength divided by density).
« Last Edit: 01/30/2018 12:58 pm by Robotbeat »
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Offline Athrithalix

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Given that they're adding a few percent of iron atoms and trying to introduce faults in the crystal structure, I would be surprised if the density of this material went from as low as aluminium to as high as steel.

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