Evaluation of Abrasive Wear Resistance of Al2O3/7075 Composite by Taguchi Experimental Design Technique

Two-body abrasive wear resistance of 7075 Al-alloy reinforced with 20 wt% Al₂O₃ particles has been studied with reference to unreinforced base alloy by design of experimental technique. Taguchi L₉ orthogonal array and analysis of variance techniques considering four factors, i.e., load, size of SiC abrasive particle, velocity and sliding distance, each at three different levels, have been employed. The experimental results reveal that wear resistance of composite is far superior than that of the unreinforced base alloy under any given test condition. In general, the most dominating factor is found to be the size of abrasive particle followed by load for both base alloy and composite. The confirmation tests reveal the accuracy level ±?5.52 and ±?6.06% for base alloy and composite, respectively. Mechanism of abrasive wear and the difference of wear response of base alloy and composite are discussed via characterizations of worn surface and generated wear debris.