Development of a novel magnesium-copper based composite with improved mechanical properties

Magnesium based composite with 17.95 wt.% of copper reinforcement was fabricated using an innovative DMD technique followed by hot extrusion. Microstructural characterization of the extruded composite samples showed fairly uniform reinforcement distribution, presence of Mg-Cu based intermetallics, good Cu-P-Mg interfacial integrity, and the presence of minimal porosity. Mechanical properties characterization revealed that the presence of copper as reinforcement lead to a significant increase in hardness, elastic modulus, 0.2% yield strength and UTS of pure magnesium while the ductility was adversely affected. An attempt is made in the present study to correlate the effect of copper as reinforcement with the microstructural and mechanical propel-ties of magnesium. (C) 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.