1996 Volume 46 Issue 11 Pages 570-575
Vanadium is a useful element for the removal of silicon from the recycled aluminum melt by filtering since it reacts with silicon and forms giant intermetallic compounds. In such a procedure, vanadium may remain in the melt, but its influence on various properties of aluminum alloys has not been made clear. This study was conducted for the purpose of clarifying the influence of the remained vanadium on various properties of 6061 aluminum alloy from a view point of metallography. V2Mg3Al18, Al3V, Al–Si–V–Mg and V2Mg3Al18 compounds are crystallized by a vanadium addition to 6061 aluminum alloy. Peak hardness of the alloy with 2.79%V is lowered because both silicon and magnesium are contained in the compounds. Tensile strength and proof strength of the alloy containing vanadium more than 0.46% gradually decrease up to the vanadium content of 1.33%, at which the largest peak hardness appears, and remarkably decrease in the range over 1.33%V as vanadium content increases. Ductility, toughness and formability are largely degraded with an increase ofvanadium content. This is caused by a fact that larger amount of coarse compounds crystallize as vanadium content is higher. Consequently, it is required that vanadium content in the 6061 alloy is less than 0.2% to guarantee the elongation satisfying the JIS value.
