THE TENSILE STRENGTH EFFECTS ON PRECIPITATION HEAT TREATMENT OF 6061-T6 ALUMINUM ALLOY

摘要

The paper presents an experimental study on precipitation of 6061-T6 aluminum alloy to determine the effects of artificial ageing on the effect of strength. The precipitation hardening usually undergoes a thermal treatment, which consists of a solution heat treatment (550℃ for 1 hour), quenching (water, at room temperature) and artificial ageing. The experimental study is focused on artificial ageing upon which the temperature is varying between 175℃ to 420℃ at different period of time. The Vickers hardness test was carried out to evaluate the hardness before and after ageing. The optimum ageing time and temperature were also determined at the end of this experiment to obtain reductions in energy and total cost. The study leads to the conclusion that the optimum aged can be achieve within 175℃ to 195℃ with 2 to 6 hours of ageing time.