Effects of material composition on the quality of ceramic-metal composite cladding onto Al-alloys with a pulsed Nd-YAG laser

A pulsed Nd-YAG laser was adopted in this research in order to investigate the effects of ceramic-metal composite cladding processes on Al-alloys. The effects of various compositions of substrate Al-alloys and ceramic-metal composite powders on the cladding quality of high-power pulsed Nd-YAG laser cladding on Al-alloys was investigated using a constant energy intensity to isolate the materials as the variable. The cladding of a (SiC+Al-Si) ceramic-metal composite layer onto an A6061 Al-alloy always caused serious shrinkage cavities within the substrate material. The cladding of a (WC+Al) ceramic-metal composite layer onto an A6061 Al-alloy significantly reduced the number of shrinkage cavities created within the substrate layer. The penetration depth of (WC+Al) cladding is, however, slightly less than that of (SiC+Al-Si) cladding.