School of Mechanical, Materials, Mechatronic and Biomedical Engineering
Abstract
Based on the unique structure and excellent properties of graphene, the graphene nanoplates (GNP) were added to the traditional Cu-SiC composites. In this study, planetary ball milling, cold pressing and sintering were utilised to fabricate the Cu-SiC-GNP composites, which might be a route of the efficient industrial manufacturing of Cu-SiC-GNP composites.
As for a new material, processing parameters of Cu-SiC-GNP needed to be investigated first. At the beginning of study, the as-received copper and Cu-SiC-GNP milled for 2 h were used to find an appropriate sintering temperature. Morphology, density and hardness were all employed and analysed. The connection of grains for Cu and Cu-SiC-GNP tended to increase while the ratio of pore and void inclined to decrease. Considering both curves of density vs. sintering temperature and curves of microhardness vs. sintering temperature, the best sintering temperature for these two kinds of materials was 800 degrees C. Furthermore, it was found that sintering of Cu-SiC-GNP composites was harder because of the addition of SiC and GNP with higher melting points..
