Development of carbonaceous tin-based solder composite achieving unprecedented joint performance

Abstract

Weight reduction and improved strength are two common engineering goals in the joining sector to benefit transport, aerospace, and nuclear industries amongst others. Here, in this paper, we show that the suitable addition of carbon nanomaterials to a tin-based solder material matrix (C-Solder® supplied by Cametics Ltd.) results in two-fold strength of soldered composite joints. Single-lap shear joint experiments were conducted on soldered aluminium alloy (6082 T6) substrates. The soldering material was reinforced in different mix ratios by carbon black, graphene, and single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) and benchmarked against the pristine C-solder®. The material characterisation was performed using Vickers micro-indentation, differential scanning calorimetry and nano-indentation, whereas functional testing involved mechanical shear tests using single-lap aluminium soldered joints and creep tests. The hardness was observed to improve in all cases except for the 0.01 wt.% graphene reinforced solders, with 5% and 4% improvements in 0.05 carbon black and SWCNT reinforced solders, respectively. The maximum creep indentation was noted to improve for all solder categories with maximum 11% and 8% improvements in 0.05 wt.% carbon black and SWCNT reinforced ones. In general, the 0.05 wt.% nanomaterial reinforced solders promoted progressive cohesion failure in the joints as opposed to instantaneous fully de-bonded failure observed in pristine soldered joints, which suggests potential application in high-performance structures where no service load induced adhesion failure is permissible (e.g. aerospace assemblies). The novel innovation developed here will pave the way to achieving high-performance solder joining without carrying out extensive surface preparations.

Effect of Carbon Nanotubes on the Mechanical, Thermal, and Electrical Properties of Tin-Based Lead-Free Solders: A Review

“…It is essential to understand their strengthening mechanisms to facilitate the development of CNT composite solders. So far, many strengthening mechanisms of CNTs have been reported, and the widely accepted ones mainly include the following four [25][26][27]: (1) load transfer strengthening; (2) dislocation interference strengthening (Orowan strengthening); (3) mismatch strengthening; and (4) fine grain strengthening. These mechanisms synergistically reinforce the matrix [28].…”

Graphene Nanoplatelets/Barium Titanate Polymer Nanocomposite Fibril: A Remanufactured Multifunctional Material with Unprecedented Electrical, Thermomechanical, and Electromagnetic Properties

“…We determined the peak crystallization temperature (T c ), melting temperature(T m ), and the heat of fusion(ΔH f ), of the polypropylene phase in the samples using DSC. We also calculated the crystallinity(X c ) of the materials using Equation (6). Figure 8a,b depicts the melting and crystallization behavior of polypropylene in the polypropylene-polyethylene-terephthalate blend (B), FC, GBNC1, GBNC2, GBFNC1, GBFNC2, and GBFNC3 groups observed by DCS.…”

“…[5] The nanocomposites combine the functional and structural properties of nanomaterials and polymers for benefiting traceability, properties tailoring and recyclability, [2,4] with emerging applications in electronics, energy storage, biomedical devices, and automotive parts. [6][7][8][9][10][11] On the other hand, immiscible polymer blend-based nanocomposites are particularly appealing because they offer characteristics that traditional composites do not. Blends of immiscible polymers contain two or more polymers that do not mix but instead generate distinct phases in a composite material, that enables the development of various immiscible polymer blend-based nanocomposites.…”