Manufacturing of Nanostructured Blades for a Francis Turbine by Isothermal Forging of AA6063

Abstract

This research work deals with the manufacturing of blades for a Francis turbine with a submicrometric structure through the isothermal forging of a heattreatable aluminum alloy that has been previously processed by angular channel extrusion. In addition, mechanical properties and microstructure of these same blades are analyzed. A comparative study is also carried out between the properties obtained in the forged blades from the alloy previously deformed through angular channel extrusion and those obtained by employing two other isothermal forging processes of this alloy which mean utilizing different process stages. Moreover, a modeling by finite element about the isothermal forging process of the blades is performed using flow rules obtained from compression tests on these alloys at different temperatures. In this way, a much higher degree of accuracy is achieved in the results compared with that obtained through traditional approaches. With this present study, it is intended to make some progress in the development of nanostructured mechanical components with the aim of demonstrating the feasibility of their manufacturing and achieving an improvement in their mechanical properties.