The present study reflects on the wear behaviour characteristics of A356 composite with trace addition of copper and copper-coated zinc as reinforcements. Dry sliding wear tests were conducted on fabricated as-cast and heat treated composites by varying load of 20-60 N under constant sliding speed of 1 m/s and sliding distance of 3000 m. Results confirmed that copper-coated zinc was successfully introduced as reinforcement into A356 matrix using two-step casting method. Scanning Electron Microscope (SEM) images confirmed the presence and homogeneous distribution of the added reinforcements in the matrix. T6 treatment with addition of Cu reinforcement facilitated age hardening showing 121% hardness improvement compared to as-cast matrix A356. At lower loads, wear results showed 117-134% enhanced wear resistance in composite reinforced with 1 wt.% Cu and aging at 100°C. However at higher loads, 153-210% improvement in wear resistance was observed. Overall, copper and Cu-coated zinc reinforced composite along with T6 treatment exhibited significant improvement in hardness wear property compared to as-cast matrix A356 alloy.

Present research work is focused on investigation of material removal rate in Wire-ED Machining (EDM) of artificially aged Al-6061/ B4C reinforced composites with 2-6 wt.% in peak aged condition. Combined effect of B4C and artificial aging at 100°C improved the hardness by 20 - 170% under as cast and artificially aged condition. Initially the wire EDM experiments are conducted on Al6061 alloy and then the process parameters such as current, pulse-on time (ton) and pulse-off time (toff) are optimized to obtain the high material removal rate (MRR). At optimized conditions test samples with various % of B4C are machined to study their influence on MRR. The study revealed that current and toff had a significant influence. MRR increased as current is increased and it decreased as toff is increased. Maximum MRR at optimum settings, current : 5.53 A, Toff: 10 µs and Ton: 36.46 µs is 2.45 mg/min. Considering the limitation of the experimental set up the modified optimum settings (Toff: 10 µs, Ton: 30 µs and current : 5 A) resulted in average MRR of 2.39 mg/min with deviation of 0.20 mg/min. The study showed that there is no significant difference in MRR and the morphology of the machined surface with respect to test samples of different % of B4C particles as reinforcement in Al6061 composite.