Effect of Grain Refiners and/or Modifiers on the Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of Al-Si Alloy (LM6)

Grain refinement is one of the most important and popular melt treatment process for Al-Si alloy casting. Microstructure and mechanical properties of commercially available Aluminium Silicon alloy LM6 can be improved with the addition of grain refiners and modifiers as these provide technical and economic advantages. This paper is an effort to study the effects of addition of grain refiners and modifiers to the eutectic Al – Si alloy LM6. Commercially available Al - Si alloy LM6 (eutectic = 12% Si) is grain refined with Al-5Ti-1B and Al-3B; and modified with Al-10Sr master alloys. These were added individually and then tested for its unique mechanical properties such as ultimate tensile strength, hardness and wear; which are co-related with the machining tests such as turning, surface roughness and drilling. The test results are compared with microstructure of the samples observed through SEM.The mechanical properties of this alloy can be altered after addition of master alloys, which in turn alter the grain size. Thus the results conclude that the mechanical properties of Al-Si alloys in general are controlled by a number of principal microstructural features. A fine grain size is desirable, leading to improvement of mechanical properties.