Study of bottom ash reinforced aluminum metal matrix composite for automotive parts

Low cost and light materials nowadays are the requirements for industry, especially automotive. An aluminum based metal matrix composite (MMC) with bottom ash reinforcement is developed as input and ideas for automotive industry, because of its properties are equivalent with metals, however this MMC is lighter, cheaper, and easy to get. The objective of the study is creating automotive parts using Al metal matrix with bottom ash reinforcement c omposite. Al-bottom ash composite is formed by HAS method then necessary machining added. The tests performed to the composite are tensile test, hardness test, corrosion and microstructure. The result shows the number of mechanical properties in general, mechanical properties increased about by 30% compared with properties of standard propeller found in market. The microstructure images support the other mechanical destructive testing that Al-bottom ash composite can be used as an alternative as automotive parts.