Influence of cobalt addition on microstructure and damping properties of Cu-Al-Ni shape memory alloys

Abstract

Copper-based shape memory alloys (SMAs) gaining attention due to their high damping properties during martensitic transformation and effective in energy dissipation which is applicable to damping application. However, copper-based SMAs such as the ternary Cu-Al-Ni are not easily deformed in the lower temperature martensitic phase which can be attributed to brittleness induced by coarse grain size, high degree of order and elastic anisotropy. Hence, this study aims to improve the properties of Cu-Al-Ni SMAs by addition of fourth alloying element. In this research, Cu-Al-Ni alloys with the addition of the fourth additional element, cobalt were prepared by casting. Microstructure characteristics of Cu-Al-Ni SMAs with and without Co addition were investigated via scanning electron microscopy (SEM) coupled with energy dispersive spectroscopy (EDS) and x-ray diffraction (XRD). Damping capacity was determined by dynamic mechanical analysis (DMA). It was found that the alloy with 0.7 wt% of Co addition showed the best improvement on the damping properties.