Controlled shrinkage of expanded glass particles in metal syntactic foams

Metal matrix syntactic foams have been fabricated via counter-gravity infiltration of a packed bed of recycled expanded glass particles (EG) with A356 aluminum alloy. Particle shrinkage was studied and has been utilized to increase the particles' strength and tailor the mechanical properties of the expanded glass/metal syntactic foam (EG-MSF). The crushing strength of particles could be doubled by shrinking them for 20 min at 700 °C. Owing to the low density of EG (0.20-0.26 g/cm³), the resulting foam exhibits a low density (1.03-1.19 g/cm³) that increases slightly due to particle shrinkage. Chemical and physical analyses of EG particles and the resulting foams were conducted. Furthermore, metal syntactic foam samples were tested in uni-axial compression tests. The stress-strain curves obtained exhibit three distinct regions: elastic deformation followed by a stress plateau and densification commencing at 70-80% macroscopic strain. Particle shrinkage increased the mechanical strength of the foam samples and their average plateau stress increased from 15.5 MPa to 26.7 MPa.