Journal of Engineering Science, Vol.

7, 37–49, 2011 37

Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam

Produced by Sintering Dissolution Process Using NaCl Space Holder

Z. Hussain* and N. S. A. Suffin

School of Materials and Mineral Resources Engineering,

Universiti Sains Malaysia, Engineering Campus, 14300 Nibong Tebal,
Pulau Pinang, Malaysia
*
Corresponding author: [email protected]

Abstract: In the present work, aluminium foam has been fabricated by sintering an
aluminium and NaCl powder mixture followed by a dissolution process. The aim of this
research was to study the effect of NaCl space holder content on the morphology and
compression properties of aluminium foam. Aluminium foam with porosity in the range of
20–70% and an average pore size of between 400 and 500 µm was produced. Foam
produced using 60 wt% NaCl exhibits the highest energy absorption because the foam
structure collapsed at higher strain during compression loading. However, 80 wt% NaCl
resulted in the foam with the lowest compressive properties and energy absorption
because residual NaCl particles caused brittleness.

Keywords: aluminium foams, sintering dissolution process, compressive properties,

energy absorption, compressive deformation mechanisms

1. INTRODUCTION

As a new class of structural materials, metal foams have a good potential

in automotive, railway, aerospace and chemical applications, where weight
reduction, chemical pollutant minimisation and improvement in comfort and
safety are demanded.1 Metal foams have an extended stress plateau in their
compressive stress-strain curves, which is effective for absorbing energy.
Currently, there is an increasing interest in using aluminium foams because of
their advantages, such as relatively high stiffness despite very low density, high
corrosion resistance, excellent noise absorption and vibration suppression and
ease of recycling.2 Thus, aluminium provides environmental and economic
benefits to communities and industries across the country. Moreover, aluminium
foams that consist of 20–95% pores exhibit superior performance in terms of
energy absorption with respect to polymeric foams, despite their greater weight
per unit volume.3 For example, aluminium foams have a range of allowable

© Penerbit Universiti Sains Malaysia, 2011

Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam 38

temperatures that is five times larger than that of polymer foams, which have a
maximum temperature limit of approximately 100ºC.4

Several methods exist for the manufacture of aluminium foam, namely

melt-gas injection, melt-foaming, powder metallurgy, investment casting and
melt infiltration.5 Driven by cost effectiveness and flexibility that leads to
designer foams, powder metallurgy has been considered a suitable method for
aluminium foam fabrication and has attracted many researchers.5–7 Zhao and Sun8
introduced a new development in the powder metallurgy process for aluminium
foam fabrication called the sintering dissolution process (SDP), which involves
milling, compaction, sintering and dissolution processes. SDP is a process that
uses a space holder, which produces an open-cell aluminium foam after
dissolving the preform.

Zhihua et al.10 reported that the elastic modulus and compressive strength
of foams depend on the relative density and cell size. Densification strain is
sensitive to the relative density; the value decreases with the increase in relative
density. Consistent with the findings of Zhihua et al.,10 Yu et al.11 observed that
the effect of cell size on the compressive and energy absorption properties of
aluminium foam can be clearly observed when foams with large cell sizes exhibit
an extended plateau in their stress-strain curves, which indicates a higher energy
absorption capability. From these studies, it is clear that the compressive
properties are influenced by the cell size as well as density of foams.

One of the most difficult tasks in fabricating metallic foams using the
SDP method is to obtain a good distribution of pores in the foam structure. The
distribution of pores is important because the properties of foam materials depend
on their pore structure. Another problem faced during aluminium foam
fabrication using SDP is the inhomogeneity of pore shapes because of the strong
relationship between morphology and mechanical properties. Jiang et al.9 claimed
that aluminium foams made by SDP may have weaker mechanical properties
compared with those fabricated using other techniques, such as infiltration or
casting methods. Generally, pore shape is reflected by the shape of the space
holder. For example, Mu et al.,12 who investigated the compressive deformation
and failure process in aluminium foams, concluded that pore shape influences the
mechanism pore deformation.

Many researchers have investigated the effect of pore shape and seem
more interested in rounded space holders to avoid stress formation between the
space holder and metallic powder. The amount of space holder used will affect
the morphology of foam structures when interconnected pores are formed, which
make the pore size become larger. To obtain a foam structure with a tailored
morphology distribution, an appropriate space holder must be selected to control
Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 7, 37–49, 2011 39

the shapes of pores. Jiang et al.9 fabricated open-cell aluminium foams with
porosities between 50% and 80% using carbamide. They found that the pore
shape obtained depended on the shape and size distribution of carbamide.
Michailidis and Stegioudi5 also applied the same method using crystalline raw
cane sugar to produce open-cell metal foams with porosities in range of 40–70%.

Based on the problems mentioned above, it can be reiterated that the

morphology and porosity of aluminium foams depend on the composition of the
space holder used in the fabrication process. In this paper, aluminium foam with
different cell sizes and densities were fabricated using a NaCl space holder. The
aim was to correlate the amount of NaCl to the pore morphology and densities of
aluminium foams to improve the compressive properties and energy absorption
capability of foams.

2. EXPERIMENTAL

Pure aluminium powder with a purity of 99.8% and particle size of 35

µm was used as the starting material. NaCl with an average particle size of 1 mm
was chosen as the space holder. The aluminium powder was mixed thoroughly
with the NaCl particles in a ball mill for 1 hour according to the composition
ratio listed in Table 1. A small amount of ethanol was added during milling to
prevent powder segregation. The mixture was pressed at 200 MPa into a
cylindrical compact. The green compact was sintered in a tube furnace at 570ºC
under an argon atmosphere for 5 hours of soaking time. The NaCl particles in the
sintered aluminium were removed by dissolution in hot water at 90°C for 1 hour.

Table 1: Compositions of mixture powder.

Foam Al (wt%) NaCl (wt%)
Al-20NaCl 80 20
Al-40NaCl 60 40
Al-60NaCl 40 80
Al-80NaCl 20 80

The density and porosity of the produced foams were calculated from
Equations 1 and 2.5,6 The structure of the aluminium foams, including cell
morphology and microstructure, was examined using a Stereo Zoom optical
microscope and Supra 35VP field-emission scanning electron microscope
(VPFESEM).
Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam 40

wa
Foam density, ρ foam = × ρ liquid (1)
wc − wb
  pf 
Foam porosity, ρ foam = 1-    × 100% (2)
  PAl  
PAl = 2.7g / cm3 , Pf = foam density, ρliquid = 1g / cm3

The compressive properties of the foams were measured using an axial

mechanical testing machine at a crosshead speed of 1 mm/min at room
temperature. The specimens used for the compression test were 13 mm in
diameter and 26 mm in height. The energy absorption of the aluminium foams
can be calculated from the area under their stress-strain curves using Equation
3:13,14

s (3)
W= ∫ σ dε
0

where W is the energy absorption capability, and σ and ε are the compression
stress and strain, respectively.

3. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

3.1 Density and Porosity of Foams

Figure 1 shows the density and porosity of foams with different NaCl
contents. It can be observed that solid aluminium has a higher density compared
with aluminium foam. It is clear that the addition of NaCl particles during
fabrication reduces the density of aluminium foam. With the dissolution process
done in hot water after sintering, the solid aluminium turned into foam through
the removal of NaCl particles, as NaCl dissolves in water. The spaces that are
created by the NaCl particles become pores, which make the material become
lighter. The Al-80NaCl foam exhibited the lowest density and highest porosity
compared with other foams. The reduction in density was caused by the presence
of a high volume of pores.
Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 7, 37–49, 2011 41

Figure 1: Density and porosity of aluminum foam prepared using different content
of NaCl.

3.2 Foam Morphology

It can be seen from Figures 2 and 3 that the foam microstructures vary in
pore size and shape. The pore shape replicated the initial cubic shape of the NaCl
particles. The following sequence of foam compositions was observed to reflect
the pore size in ascending order: Al-20NaCl, Al-40NaCl, Al-60NaCl and Al-
80NaCl. From these findings, it is reasonable to infer that by increasing the
percentage of NaCl particles, aluminium foams with larger sizes and higher
quantities of pores can be obtained. The isolated pores are the most obvious in
the Al-20NaCl foam compared with the other foams. As the amount of NaCl
increased, interconnected pores were clearly observed, especially in the 20Al-
80NaCl foam. This observation indicates that higher space holder contents
generate interconnected pores because of the formation of numerous channels
between cells, which make foams suitable for absorption applications and
components.15
Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam 42

Figure 2: Optical micrograph of typical microscopic structure of Al foam prepared with

different content of NaCl: (a) Al-20NaCl; (b) Al-40NaCl; (c) Al-60NaCl; (d)
Al-80NaCl.

The relationship between pore size, cell walls and foam density is
important to explain the properties of the foams. The characteristics of pores
measured from the SEM micrograph shown in Figure 3 are listed in Table 2.
Thinner cell walls and larger pore sizes lead to lower foam densities. Thin cell
walls developed when large amounts of space holder were used, which led to the
formation of closely spaced pores. It has been shown that the Al-80NaCl foam,
which had the highest percentage of space holder, had the largest pore size and
the smallest wall thickness. As a result, the foam with the lowest density was
obtained.
Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 7, 37–49, 2011 43

Figure 3: Pore micrograph observation of aluminum foam: (a) Al-20NaCl; (b) Al-
40NaCl; (c) Al-60NaCl; (d) Al-80NaCl.

Table 2: Pores characteristic of aluminum foams.

Foam Al-20NaCl Al-40NaCl Al-60NaCl Al-80NaCl
3
Density (g/cm ) 1.99 1.90 1.69 1.30
Average Pore Size (µm) 403.75 422.50 446.86 500.25
Average Wall Thickness (µm) 148.33 117.14 98.57 75.07

3.3 Mechanical Properties

3.3.1 Compressive properties

Figure 4 shows stress-strain curves plotted during compression testing

for different aluminium foams prepared using different NaCl particle contents.
The stress-strain compression curve can be divided into three stages: (i) linear
elastic deformation stage, (ii) plateau deformation stage, and (iii) densification
stage. From the stress-strain curves of the foams, the compressive strength, yield
stress and modulus can be determined as listed in Table 3. Apparently, increasing
the NaCl particle content causes a decrease in the yield strength. The solid
aluminium reference curve shows the highest yield strength. As shown in Figure
4, the elastic modulus, which is indicated by the slope of the graph, decreases
Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam 44

with the increasing porosity of the foam. This decrease in results is because high
porosity elastic deformation may easily occur and results in a reduction in the
elastic modulus. Solid aluminium has a higher modulus compared to aluminium
foam.

Stress (MPa)

Strain

Figure 4: Compressive stress-strain curves of aluminum foam with different percentages

of NaCl.
Energy absorption (MJ/m3)

Strain

Figure 5: Energy absorption curve of aluminum foam.

Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 7, 37–49, 2011 45

Table 3: Stress-strain curve properties of solid aluminum and aluminum foam with
various compositions.
Foam Solid Al Al-20NaCl Al-40NaCl Al-60NaCl Al-80NaCl
Compressive Strength 370.968 271.107 245.692 222.524 19.718
(MPa)
Offset Yield Stress 299.056 176.085 144.421 144.455 134.952
(MPa)
Yield Strain 0.004 0.113 0.199 0.354 0.203
Modulus (GPa) 161.262 1.587 0.732 0.410 0.080

In addition, the modulus of the Al-20NaCl foam is much higher (1.587

GPa) compared with Al-80NaCl foam (0.08 GPa). Xiao-qing et al.16 explained
that the pore size of foams influences the elastic modulus in the elastic, plastic
plateau and densification regions. In their research, a foam with a small pore size
measuring approximately 1.5 mm produced a modulus greater than that of a foam
with a larger pore size of 2.5 mm. Similar findings were also reported by Miyoshi
et al.,17 who investigated the mechanical properties of porous aluminium. They
revealed that porous aluminium with a small pore size of 1.99 mm showed a
higher stress-strain curve than that with a larger pore size of 2.68 mm. In other
words, smaller pore sizes would result in foams with greater strengths and
moduli. In the present work, the Al-20NaCl foam, which has the lowest
composition of NaCl particles showed the highest yield strength and modulus
compared with the other foams.

However, the stress-strain curve of the Al-80NaCl foam does not show
the typical compression behaviour of foam. The Al-80NaCl foam had the lowest
stress-strain curves and failed at lower strain. Foams with high porosity have
larger pore sizes and thinner cell walls. Because of this, the Al-80NaCl foam had
a weak structure. Thus, the Al-80NaCl foam may have failed because of its thin
cell walls. These thin walls could not afford to support the load and caused the
structure to collapse, which resulted in failure at low stress. This behaviour is
related to the presence of the high density of interconnected pores in the Al-
80NaCl foam, which acted as initial cracks in its structure and easily propagated
throughout the framework. The plateau stress in this type of foam declines
sharply, corresponding to brittle foam behaviour as explained by Bafti and
Habibolahzadeh.6

3.3.2 Energy absorption

The energy absorption of aluminium foams can be calculated according

to Equation 3 for strain ranges between 0.05 and 0.5; the results are shown in
Figure 6. It can be seen that the energy absorption capability of the foams grows
Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam 46

with increasing strain, though this trend was not observed for the Al-80NaCl
foam. This phenomenon shows that the cell structures in the Al-20NaCl, Al-
40NaCl and Al-60NaCl foams could support higher stress during mechanical
loading before they fractured.

Energy absorption (MJ/m3)

NaCl fraction of Nacl (w%)

Figure 6: Total energy absorption of aluminum foam.

Figure 6 shows the total energy absorption of the foams during

compressive testing. The results were calculated from the area under the stress-
strain curves in Figure 4. The Al-80NaCl foam clearly exhibited the lowest
energy absorption compared with the other foams, with its value similar to that of
solid aluminium. In addition, this foam exhibited brittle behaviour, as indicated
by the small area under its stress-strain curve, which corresponds to low energy
absorption. This trend may be related to the presence of residual NaCl particles in
the Al-80NaCl foam, which were not completely dissolved during the dissolution
process. Observation showed that 1 hour of dissolution was not adequate to fully
dissolve the amount of NaCl particles in the Al-80NaCl foam. NaCl is an ionic
compound that is brittle because of the rigid interactions between charged ions
that hold the charged particles in fixed positions.18 As a brittle material, the
remaining NaCl in the aluminium foams affected the properties of the foams. In
addition, excessive space holder content caused the cell walls of the foams to
become too thin and thus weak. Referring to Table 2 on the morphology
observation, Al-80NaCl shows the thinnest cell wall thickness (75.07 µm)
compared with the other foams. The weak cell walls of the Al-80NaCl foam did
not support further loading during the compression test.

Although the height of the stress-strain curve of the Al-20NaCl foam was
the highest, as shown in Figure 4, Figure 6 shows that the cell structures of the
Al-20NaCl foam could not support higher loads than those of the Al-40NaCl and
Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 7, 37–49, 2011 47

Al-60NaCl foams. According to Figure 6, the energy absorption increased with

increasing porosity except for the foam with 80% space holder. This result clearly
shows that energy absorption increased from solid aluminium to foams
possessing 20%, 40% and 60% space holder, respectively. This result further
demonstrates that the Al-60NaCl foam had the highest energy absorption
compared with the other foams. This is because the porosity and cell walls of this
foam formed a more homogeneous pore structure than the other foams as shown
in Figure 3. During compression, a large amount of energy was absorbed during
the stages of bending and collapse of the walls in the foam, which occurred
mainly along the long stress plateau.16 Therefore, the microstructure resulted in
the Al-60NaCl foam exhibiting better compressive and energy absorption
behaviours.

4. CONCLUSION

Using a sintering dissolution process, the fabrication of aluminium foam

with porosity in the range of 20–70% can be achieved using NaCl particles with
average pore sizes ranging from 400 to 500 µm. Increasing the amount of NaCl
powder increases the foam porosity and decreases the foam density due to an
increase in the density of interconnected pores. The compressive stress-strain
curve of the foam comprises of three regions: linear elastic, plateau and
deformation region. The compressive stress-strain curves of the foams fabricated
in this study show that there was a decrease in compressive strength with an
increase in the amount of incorporated NaCl particles as follows: Al-20NaCl, Al-
40NaCl, Al-60NaCl and Al-80NaCl, respectively. This result is due to the
presence of residual NaCl particles in the foams. Moreover, because NaCl
particles are brittle, they can decrease the compressive strength properties of
aluminium foams. However, higher energy absorption was achieved by
increasing the amount of NaCl powder, as evidenced by the extended
deformation plateau of the foams’ stress-strain curves. This result indicates that
the Al-60NaCl foam has the highest energy absorption compared with the other
foams because of its larger pore size, which supports the Al-60NaCl foam from
collapse and thus allows for longer strain during compression loading. However,
the Al-80NaCl foam exhibited the lowest compressive properties and energy
absorption because of its excessive NaCl particle content, which induced
brittleness in the foam.

5. ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

This research was supported by the Universiti Sains Malaysia Short Term
Grant 6035290 and Research University Postgraduate Research Student Grant
Microstructure and Mechanical Behaviour of Aluminium Foam 48

Scheme of Universiti Sains Malaysia (1001/PBAHAN/8032019). The second

author is supported by National Science Fellowship (NSF) from Ministry of
Science, Technology and Innovations (MOSTI).

6. REFERENCES

1. Nieh, T. G., Higashi, K. & Wadsworth, J. (2000). Effect of cell

morphology on the compressive properties of open cell aluminum foams.
Mater. Sci. Eng. A, 283(1–2), 105–110.
2. Jeon, Y. P., Kang, C. G. & Lee, S. M. (2009). Effect of cell size on
compression and bending strength of aluminum-foamed material by
complex stirring in induction heating. J. Mater. Process. Technol.,
209(1), 435–444.
3. Ishizaki, K., Komarneni, S. & Nanko, M. (1998). Porous materials:
Process technology and applications, 1–44. Dordrecht, Netherlands:
Kluwer Academic Publishers.
4. Peroni L., Avalle, M. & Peroni, M. (2008). The mechanical behavior of
aluminum foam structures in different loading conditions. Int. J. Impact
Eng., 35(7), 644–658.
5. Michailidis, N. & Stergioudi, F. (2011). Establishment of process
parameters for producing Al-foam by dissolution and powder sintering
method. Mater. Des., 32(3), 1559–1564.
6. Bafti, H. & Habibolahzadeh, A. (2010). Production of aluminum foam by
spherical carbamide space holder technique-processing parameters.
Mater. Des., 31(9), 4122–4129.
7. Jiang, B., Zhao, N. Q., Shi, C. S., Du, X. W., Li, J. J. & Man, H.
C. (2005). A novel method for making open cell aluminum foams by
powder sintering process. Mater. Lett., 59(26), 3333–3336.
8. Zhao, Y. Y. & Sun, D. X. (2001). A novel sintering-dissolution process
for manufacturing Al foams. Scr. Mater., 44(1), 105–110.
9. Jiang, B., Zhao, N. Q., Shi, C. S. & Li, J. J., (2005). Processing of open
cell aluminum foams with tailored porous morphology. Scr. Mater., 53,
781–785.
10. Zhihua, W., Hongwei, M., Longmao, Z. & Guitong, Y. (2006). Studies
on the dynamic compressive properties of open cell aluminum alloy
foams. Scr. Mater., 54, 83–87.
11. Yu, H., Guo, Z., Li, B., Yao, G., Luo, H. & Liu, Y. (2007). Research into
the effect of cell diameter of aluminum foam on its compressive and
energy absorption properties. Mater. Sci. Eng. A, 454–455, 542–546.
12. Mu, Y., Yao, G., Liang, L., Luo, H. & Zu, G. (2010). Deformation
mechanisms of closed cell aluminum foam in compression. Scr. Mater.,
63(6), 629–632.
Journal of Engineering Science, Vol. 7, 37–49, 2011 49

13. Cady, C. M., Gray, G. T., Liu, C., Lovato, M. L. & Mukai, T. (2009).
Compressive properties of a closed cell aluminum foam as a function of
strain rate and temperature. Mater. Sci. Eng. A, 525, 1–6.
14. Yu, S., Liu, J., Wei, M., Luo, Y., Zhu, X., Liu, Y. (2009). Compressive
property and energy absorption characteristic of open cell ZA22 foam.
Mater. Des., 30, 87–90.
15. Surace, R., De Fhilippis, L. A. C, Ludovico, A. D. & Boghetich, G.
(2009). Influence of processing parameters on aluminum foam produced
by space holder technique. Mater. Des., 30, 1878–1885.
16. Xiao-qing, C., Zhi-hua, W., Hong-wei, M., Long-mao, Z. & Gui-tong, Y.
(2006). Effects of cell size on compressive properties of aluminum foam.
Trans. Nonferrous Met. Soc. China, 16, 351–356.
17. Miyoshi, T., Itoh, M., Mukai, T., Kanahashi, H., Kohzu, H., Tanabe, S.
& Higash K. (1999). Enhancement of energy absorption in a closed-
cell aluminum by the modification of cellular structures. Scr
Mater., 41(10), 1055–1060.
18. Chemguide. (2000). Ionic structures. Retrieved July 2010,
www.chemguide.co.uk.