Fabrication of aluminium composites reinforced with carbon fibres by a centrifugal infiltration process

Centrifugal-force infiltration was used for obtaining aluminium alloy composites reinforced with carbon fibre by the infiltration of preforms. The lost-wax-casting technique was used during the manufacturing process. Preforms fabricated with different percentages of reinforcement were heated to facilitate their filling with aluminium. Some samples were coated with nickel to favor the reinforcement wetting by the molten aluminium alloy. Composites with volume fraction of reinforcements above 7 vol.% and porosity values lower than 0.5 vol.% were obtained with this technique. The hardness of the composites increased with the volume fraction of reinforcement and the solution and the later precipitation of nickel coating caused an additional hardening effect.