Author : Ganesh Rajendra Jamgaonkar, J. Jayakumar and Sagar Kailas More

This Magnesium with its good strength to weight ratio is one of the candidate materials to realize light weight construction, but it has to compete with various other materials. Today’s interest in magnesium alloys for automotive applications is based on the combination of high strength properties and low density. For this reason magnesium alloys are very attractive as structural materials in all applications where weight savings are of great concern. In automotive applications weight reduction will improve the performance of a vehicle by reducing the rolling resistance and energy of acceleration, thus reducing the fuel consumption and moreover a reduction of the greenhouse gas CO2 can be achieved. In automobile wheels rotates continuously during propulsion therefore total load on a vehicle induces alternating fatigue stress in a wheel rim. In order to sustain all loads and practical conditions wheel materials must be of good quality. Magnesium is the lightest of all metals used as the basis for constructional alloys. The requirement to reduce the weight of car components as a result in part of the introduction of legislation limiting emission has triggered renewed interest in magnesium. The growth rate over the next 10 years has been forecast to be 7% per annum. Magnesium has a long history in automotive applications. In this project, we are going to make the hot rolled sheet by using the vacuum stir casting furnace and hot extrusion process. Material used for this process is Mg alloy (AZ91)-Carbon Nano Tube and by comparing the properties with the existing wheel rim material.

Keywords: Magnesium alloy (AZ91), Carbon Nano-Tubes, FEA of wheel rim, Vacuum stir casting process, Hot extrusion process.

Article published in International Journal of Current Engineering and Technology, Vol.6, No.5 (Oct-2016)