- Home
- Companies
- CeramTec Group
- Products
- CeramTec - Metal Matrix Composites ...
CeramTec - Metal Matrix Composites (MMC) for Light Metal Components
CeramTec is at the forefront of developing Metal Matrix Composites (MMC) to enhance the performance of lightweight metal components primarily used in the automotive and industrial sectors. MMCs are engineered by embedding hard ceramic particles into a metal matrix such as aluminum, magnesium, or titanium. This integration leads to components that possess the lightweight properties of metals while significantly boosting their mechanical, thermal, and tribological resilience due to the ceramic reinforcement. CeramTec's approach involves the use of porous ceramic preforms during the casting process, enabling a seamless integration of metal and ceramic phases. With tailored ceramic contents and adjustable grain and pore sizes, CeramTec can cater to various industry needs. Silicon carbide and aluminum oxide preforms are typical examples, catering to applications requiring high abrasion resistance and enhanced mechanical strength, respectively. CeramTec's expertise in manufacturing and machining ensures the optimal performance of MMC components.
The range of applications for high-strength light metal components – primarily aluminum, but also magnesium and titanium – is constantly growing. The motivation for using light metals in the automotive industry is to reduce weight and ultimately lower fuel consumption and emissions.
However, light metal construction reaches its limits where it has to withstand high tribological, mechanical or thermal loads. The solution is the targeted reinforcement of lightweight components at the points of maximum stress. Such composites of metal and ceramics, so-called metal-matrix composites (also: metal-matrix composites, MMC), consist of a metal (matrix) reinforced with hard ceramic particles.
The result is a product that has the advantages of both materials, namely the low weight of metal on the one hand and the high performance of ceramics on the other.
Application examples for metal-ceramic composites:
- Antenna waveguides in the Hubble Space Telescope
- Commercial satellites
- Automotive industry, e.g. cylinder liners and brake discs
- Aerospace, e.g. rotor blade sleeves in helicopters
Recent innovations have significantly reduced the production and machining costs associated with MMCs. As the world's leading supplier of technical ceramics, CeramTec has developed a process to produce lightweight MMC components efficiently and economically while maintaining the highest quality standards.
CeramTec's highly porous ceramic preforms are infiltrated by the molten metal during the casting of the MMC product. This creates a continuous transition between metal- and ceramic-reinforced areas. Our preform technology opens up a wide range of new applications.
- Lightweight construction
- Enhanced mechanical strength
- Increased hardness and wear resistance
- Enhanced tribology
- Increased Young‘s modulus
- Lower thermal expansion
- Adjustable thermal properties
- Improved fatigue resistance
- Higher oxidation resistance (of hard component)
CeramTec's MMC preforms are tailored to the needs of our customers and can be used with standard aluminium alloys.
CeramTec offers a ceramic content between 35 and 70%, whereby grain and pore sizes are equally adjustable. For high performance products, an additional hardening additive can be used to further improve the properties. Diverse and complex geometries are possible with this manufacturing process.
Our preform concept, combined with our tooling expertise, offers improved performance as well as lower total cost of ownership. Our preform portfolio includes a wide range of standard oxide and non-oxide ceramic materials.