Synthesis of Nanocrystalline AZ91 Magnesium Alloy Dispersed with 15 vol.% Submicron SiC Particles by Mechanical Milling

The development of a magnesium matrix composite with a high content of dispersions using conventional liquid-phase process is a great challenge, especially for nanometer/submicron particles. In this work, mechanical milling was employed to prepare nanocrystalline AZ91 dispersed with 15 vol.% submicron SiC particles (SiCp/AZ91). AZ91 with no SiCp was applied as a comparative study with the same mechanical milling. In order to investigate the mechanism of dispersing, the morphology evolution of powders and the corresponding SiCp distribution were observed. As the scanning electron microscope (SEM) analysis exhibited, the addition of SiCp accelerated the smashing of AZ91 particles, which promoted the dispersion of SiCp in AZ91. Thus, after mechanical milling, 15 vol.% SiCp, which was smashed from 800 to 255 nm, got uniformly distributed in the Mg matrix. Based on X-ray diffraction (XRD) results, part of the Mg₁₇Al₁₂ precipitate got dissolved, and an Al-supersaturated Mg solid solution was formed. The transmission electron microscopy (TEM) results showed that the ultimate Mg grain (32 nm) of milled SiCp/AZ91 was much smaller than that of milled AZ91 (64 nm), which can be attributed to a pinning effect of submicron SiCp. After mechanical milling, the hardness of SiCp/AZ91 reached 185 HV, which was 185% higher than the original AZ91 and 33% higher than milled AZ91, due to fine Mg grain and submicron dispersions.