Machinability of a silicon carbide particle-reinforced metal matrix composite

This paper presents a numerical test program to model the microstructural change associated with the machining of a particle-reinforced metal matrix composite (PRMMC). Composite materials comprising 30% and 40% volume fraction of SiC particle-reinforced 2024 aluminum alloy were modeled separately. The random particles model was adopted to analyze the micro-mechanical problems in PRMMCs. Simulation of the metal cutting process was performed using ABAQUS, an elasto-viscoplastic finite element analysis (FEA) code. Two-dimensional finite element (FE) simulations of the deformation and damage evolution in a SiC particle-reinforced aluminum alloy composite, including interphase, were performed for different microstructures and particle volume fractions of the composites. The FEA results were found to be similar to those experimentally obtained from the machined test pieces using a scanning electron microscope (SEM). On the basis of the simulation and experimental results, we obtained the effect of machined surface quality and cutting parameters on the residual stress distribution in the composite.