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Preparation and properties of controllable aluminum foam

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Mater. Res. Express 8 (2021) 026526 https://doi.org/10.1088/2053-1591/abe5ef
PAPER
Preparation and properties of controllable aluminum foam
Leilei Sun1,3 , Yanli Wang2,3 , Lucai Wang1,∗ , Fang Wang1, Hong Xu2, Wenzhan Huang1 and
Xiaohong You1
1
School of Material Science and Technology, Taiyuan University of Science and Technology, Taiyuan Shanxi Province 030024, People’s
Republic of China
2
School of Material Science and Technology, North University of China, Taiyuan Shanxi Province 030051, People’s Republic of China
3
These authors have contributed equally to the work.
∗
Author to whom any correspondence should be addressed.
E-mail: wlc1985026@tyust.edu.cn
Keywords: aluminum foam, Space holder, compression performance, Na2S2O3, ideal energy absorption efficiency
Abstract
As an important method for preparing aluminum foam, space holders have the advantages of simple
preparation process, controllable porosity, high operation safety, easy to realize the large-scale
production and so on. In this paper, sodium thiosulfate (Na2S2O3) is selected as the new raw material
for spacer to replace the traditional spacer (such as urea and salt), which is prepared by melting,
injecting into the mold and solidifying. Three kinds of spherical spacer with different diameters were
modified, and aluminum foams with three porosity (65%, 70% and 75%) and three pore sizes
(Ø2mm, Ø3mm and Ø4mm) were prepared by compaction, dissolution and sintering. The results of
metallographic analysis of aluminum foam sintered sample show that the aluminum powder particles
bond closely above 600 °C. The quasi-static compression results show that the interaction between
aluminum matrix materials and pore structure affects the mechanical properties of foamed
aluminum, and the interaction between porosity and pore size affects the mechanical properties of
foamed aluminum.
1. Introduction
As an important branch of metal foam, aluminum foam is a typical type of multi-functional materials with
matrix and holes combination. Aluminum foam has excellent properties [1], such as the energy absorption
performance [2], vibration [3, 4], sound absorption [5], electromagnetic shielding [6] and heat insulation or heat
functional features [7]. It can be widely applied to aerospace, automobile manufacturing, transportation,
construction, and so on [8]. In recent years, a variety of preparation methods for aluminum foam have been
developed, such as melting gas injection [9], foaming agent foaming [10], powder metallurgy [11], investment
casting [12], Space Holder [13], and seepage method [14], etc. The closed-cell aluminum foam was prepared by
foaming agent, gas injection or powder metallurgy. In these methods, the pore structure is closely related to the
accumulation and nucleation of gas molecules, the growth, variation, and collapse of pores. The pore shape of
the aluminum foam is concerned with spherical polyhedron, and the fusion of pores tends to occur during the
foaming process to form irregular macropores. The open-cell aluminum foam was prepared by investment
casting, casting method and Space Holder, the pore shape depends on the shape of the filler, commonly used
fillers have NaCl particle and Urea particle, they are similar spherical particles. The porous structure of the
foamed aluminum is mostly polyhedron and ellipsoidal. The poor pore structure significantly reduces the
mechanical properties of the foam. Urea [15–18], Salt (NaCl) [19] and sucrose [20] were used to prepare
aluminum foam for Space Holder. This method can well reproduce the shape of spacer.
Hasan et al [15, 16] studied the aluminum foam with porosity of 40%∼85% prepared by powder sintering of
aluminum powder and urea, found out the addition of 1 wt% magnesium and 1wt% tin powder leads to liquid
phase sintering, and produces dense aluminum matrix with higher mechanical properties. Zhao Hesun and
others [21, 22] developed a sintering and dissolution process, which can easily control the pore size and porosity.
© 2021 The Author(s). Published by IOP Publishing Ltd
Mater. Res. Express 8 (2021) 026526 L Sun et al

Figure 1. (a) Sodium thiosulfate rod raw material (Na2S2O3·5H2O), a spherical particle space supports (b) Ø 2 mm, (c) Ø 3 mm, (d)
Ø 4 mm.

In this process, a mixture of aluminum powder as a substrate and sodium chloride (NaCl) powder as spacer was
sintered, and then leached in water to dissolve the NaCl, resulting in aluminum foam.
Space Holder [23] is very suitable for producing uniform open-cell foams made of aluminum metal with low
melting point. Urea, and NaCl are often selected as spacer, however, these spacers have weak corrosivity, which
will corrode aluminum base and reduce the mechanical properties of aluminum foam. Moreover, the residual
urea in the sintering process will decompose to produce ammonia gas, thus polluting the environment. The
sodium thiosulfate (Na2S2O3) was selected for the spacer in this paper. Its solution was non-toxic, easily soluble
in water and can be easily removed from aluminum foam; its solution is neutral, which has no corrosion to
aluminum metal and little environmental pollution.
Aluminum foams with specified porosity and uniform shape and size can be prepared by Space Holder
process. Aluminum foams have the volume fraction, shape, and size of spacer, which plays an important role in
controlling the porosity, pore size and pore distribution of aluminum foam. Good reproducibility and
predictability of mechanical properties are very important to the applications of aluminum foams. It is generally
considered that Aluminum foams with irregular pores make it difficult to predict mechanical properties. The
advantages of spherical and regular aluminum foam are homogeneous pores, regular shape and size, and the
mechanical properties can be predicted through theoretical demonstration [15]. Because of the low melting
point and good fluidity of the Na2S2O3, the shape and size of the spacer can be reshaped to prepare the spacer
with uniform size. Na2S2O3 melts can be combined with 3D printing to prepare the spacers. According to the
shape of the silica gel mold, three kinds of spherical spacers (Ø2 mm, Ø3 mm and Ø4 mm) can be prepared to
realize the controllability of the pore structure. The degree of fusion of particles was observed under a
microscope. The samples were characterized and subjected to quasi-static compression experiments, and the
effects of different pore sizes and porosity on the mechanical properties of the samples were analyzed.

2. Experimental procedures

2.1. Preparation of space holder pellets

The 3d printing technology was used to print ABS plastic mold and turned to the semi-transparent silica gel
mold to sodium thiosulfate particles. The raw material figure 1(a) show the sodium thiosulfate rod raw material

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Figure 2. Dissolution and sintering preparation process.

(Na2S2O3·5H2O), it is a colorless transparent monoclinic crystal with strong hardness. Therefore, sodium
thiosulfate can be used as a kind of safe space support. Put the rod-shaped raw materials into a beaker and melt it
in a water bath at 70 ℃. The solution was poured into a silica gel mold for 20 min. After solidification, a spherical
particle space supports with a diameter of 2 mm (figure 1(b)), 3 mm (figure 1(c)) and 4 mm (figure 1(d)) have
been obtained.

2.2. Preparation of aluminum foam samples

Aluminum powder (technically pure 99.98%, 300 meshes), the mass of space support (manufact above) and
aluminum powder were precise control of pore size and porosity, and the two were mixed evenly. Adding a small
amount of alcohol before stirring is conducive to better adhesion of aluminum powder to the surface of the
space support to improve the uniformity of pore distribution. Under the pressure of 370 MPa, the mixture was
poured into a cold press mold for 10 min to obtain a cold press block with a diameter of 40 mm and a height of 30
mm. The cold press block was taken out and then polished to remove the edges and burrs. The as-pressed
specimens were immersed in a constant temperature water bath at 60 °C for over 5h hours to ensure that the
space bracket is completely dissolved. After drying at 100 °C for 30 min, they were sintered in the furnace, and
the heating rate was set to 10 ℃ min−1. After reaching 600 °C, the foamed aluminum samples were kept for 5 h,
and then cooled to room temperature by the furnace. The size of the prepared aluminum foam sample is a
cylinder with a diameter of 40 mm and a height of 30 mm, and the porosity is 65%, 70% and 75%, the pore
diameter is 2 mm, 3 mm and 4 mm, respectively. The process is shown in figure 2.

2.3. Characterization of aluminum foam samples and quasi-static compression tests

2.3.1. Characterization of foam rate style
Relative density is be calculated by measuring mass and volume [24]. The density and relative density of the
aluminum foam are calculated by the following formula.
rfoam = Mfoam Vfoam (1)

r Re l = rfoam rmatrix (2)

where Mfoam is the mass of aluminum foam, Vfoam is the volume of foamed aluminum, rf oam is the density of
aluminum foam, r Re l is the relative density and rmatrix is the density of matrix material.
The aluminum foam samples were cut by Wire Electrical Discharge Machine, and the cut samples were
polished with sandpaper and corroded with 15% sodium hydroxide solution. Micrographs were taken under an
optical microscope, and then the samples were scanned under the printer LaserJet M1136 MFP with the
resolution set at 1200 dpi to observe the macroscopic pores and microstructure.

2.3.2. Foam proportional quasi-static compression test.

Compression test was carried out by electronic universal testing machine (UTM 5305×300 kN), and the
crosshead speed was 3 mm min−1, and was carried out three times [25]. Platform stress is the average pressure
within the range of 10%–45% strain. The densification strain is the strain at the intersection of the platform
stress line and the backward extending densification line [26].

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Figure 3. Cross section of aluminum foam sample (a) Cross section diagram of aluminum foam sample, (b) longitudinal section
diagram of aluminum foam sample (c) Longitudinal section diagram of aluminum foam samples prepared with urea as a Space
Holder. (A) the connected hole (B) the thick cell wall.

Figure 4. (a) Metallographic diagram of 500-fold pore wall (b) 2000-fold pore wall metallographic diagram A aluminum powder is not
tightly bonded B aluminum powder is tightly bonded.

After elastic yielding during uniaxial compression, the metal foam presents a plateau region. Miltz et al [27]
defined the ideal energy absorption efficiency is put forward to evaluate the energy absorption ability of foam
metal materials. The ideal energy absorption efficiency was defined as follows:

1 em
I=
sm em ò0 sde (3)

where em is strain and sm is the stress corresponding to em. The energy absorption efficiency curve describes the
deformation process of materials under different stress and corresponds to the energy absorption efficiency. The
ideal energy absorption efficiency is the ratio and dependent variable of the energy absorbed by the actual metal
foam and the energy absorbed by the ideal plastic-rigid foam metal under the same stress, it reflects the
properties of the material itself. The ideal energy absorption efficiency curve can be used to determine the energy
absorption strength of the foam, thus providing a better design basis for the foam material as an energy
absorption and buffering components.

3. Result and analysis

3.1. Characterization of aluminum foam samples

For the foam aluminum with porosity of 70% and pore size of Ø3 mm, the mass, diameter and height of the
aluminum foam were 30.24 g, 40.60 mm and 29.15 mm, respectively. According to formula 1 and formula 2, the
relative density of aluminum foam is 0.2969, which is close to the relative density of foamed aluminum with a
porosity of 70%, so the porosity can be accurately controlled by the preparation method.
Figure 3(a) shows a cross sectional view of the aluminum foam sample. The cell wall is basically uniform,
with a small amount of cells deformation on the edge. There are communication holes on the thin cell wall as
shown in part A; and the thicker hole wall as shown in Part B. Figure 3(b) shows the longitudinal cross section of
an aluminum foam sample. The cells on both sides are severely deformed, and the middle part is slightly
deformed, appearing an elliptical shape. Figure 3(c) shows an aluminum foam sample prepared by the same

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Figure 5. Effects of different porosity on compression performance (a) 2 mm aperture (b) 3mm aperture (c) 4mm aperture.

Figure 6. Schematic diagram of cell collapse process.

preparation method, in which urea is used as the space holder. The pore structure of the edge part of the
aluminum foam sample was severely deformed, and the cells in the lower part were oval.
When the powder is mixed, the aluminum powder can not be uniformly attached to the surface of the space
bracket. The remaining aluminum powder will agglomerate in the compaction process, which will lead to the
thickening of cell. During the compaction process, the inner cavity edge of the die will be subjected to greater
shear force, resulting in honeycomb deformation on the edge of the aluminum foam sample. Because of the
single pressure, some space supports have insufficient strength, and space supports will deform under pressure.
In the process of compaction, when the space supports are close to each other, thin walls will appear, and the
distance between them will be closer. When the porous agents slide with each other in the process of
compaction, connected holes will appear. These connected holes are beneficial to the better dissolution of the
space holder in the process of dissolution of the preparation process. However, under loading, the thin wall first
breaks or bends and fills the cell.
In 3(b) and 3(c), the deformation degree of cell shape of the aluminum foam sample in figure 3(b) is less than
3(c), which indicates that the hardness of sodium thiosulfate is higher than that of urea. As a space holder,
sodium thiosulfate can better reproduce its shape and reduce the deformation of cell pores during cold
compression. These deformed holes will decrease the mechanical properties of aluminum foam.
As shown in, The microscopic images (figure 4) of aluminum foam wall after polishing and corrosion is
observed under the metallographic microscope. Enlarge 500 times on the left, the upper right side of the figure
can be seen clearly, and the boundary line between the aluminum grains can be clearly seen, and the right side is
magnified by 2000 times. The arrow in the figure indicate that the boundary line between the aluminum grains is
clear, and the circular part is not obvious. This is due to the sintering process. Some aluminum powder particles
fuse on the surface and adhere to each other, forming a round part as shown in the figure. If the bonding is not
very tight, there will be a clear boundary line, which is easy to crack under pressure, resulting in fracture of the
cell wall.

3.2. Effects of mechanical properties

Figure 5 shows the stress-strain curves with porosity of 65%, 70% and 75% and pore diameter of 2 mm, 3 mm
and 4 mm respectively. Three samples were taken for the compression experiment, the average value was drawn.
It can be clearly observed from figures 5(a)–(c) that the compression performance of aluminum foam decreases
with the increase of porosity under the condition of fixed pore size [28, 29]. The reason is that with the increase

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Mater. Res. Express 8 (2021) 026526 L Sun et al

Figure 7. Densification strain point of compression curves.

Figure 8. Influence of different pore size on the compression performance of aluminum foam (a) 65% porosity (b) 70% porosity (c)
75% porosity.

of porosity, the aluminum needed to form the per unit volume cell wall decreases, the relative density of foamed
aluminum decreases, the average thickness of the cell wall decreases, the fracture and collapse stress of cell wall
decreases, and the compressibility decreases. High plateau stress fluctuates slightly, the wave phenomenon
becomes more intense with the increase of porosity. When aluminum foam was deformed under load, a certain
amount of pore walls yielded or collapsed. These fractured cell walls support each other (as shown in the
figure 6(b)) to form a bracket to bear the load, so that the plateau region of stress-strain curve tends to a stable
range, and the support frame formed by destroying the cell walls once will be destroyed again or even many
times, and even stress waves will appear.
Under the quasi-static compression deformation of aluminum foam, all curves show the similar typical
regions, namely elastic region, plateau region and densification region. In the plastic plateau region, the cell wall
is unstable and damaged, and the stress increases slowly with the strain. After entering the densification region,
the cell wall are rarely appeared, and its stress-strain behavior is close to that of dense metal materials. The cell
collapse occurred in the plastic plateau region; the sample began to enter the plastic yield stage with the strain.
When the stress of cell wall reaches the yield strength under normal stress and shear stress, the cell wall will yield,
tear or cross fracture, as shown in figure 6(b).
The fracture wall and the yield wall contacted with each other to form a support. At this time, the load
capacity will be slightly increased. With the further collapse of micropores, the fractured pore wall will fill the
micropores. The pores continued to be collapse, and the curve entered the densification region.
When the structure appears many times, it will cause the plateau area fluctuation. With the increase of
porosity, the average thickness of cell wall decreases, so the mutual support between cell walls requires larger
strain capacity.
The point where the tangent extension of the plateau stress of the stress-strain curve intersects with the
tangent extension of the densification stress is the densification point. Figure 7 shows the densification point of

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Table 1. Peak stress drop.

Cell diameter 65%–70% Peak 70%–75% Peak

mm−1 stress drop stress drop

2 22.79% 36.92%
3 41.23% 58.99%
4 59.40% 37.40%

Figure 9. Ideal energy-absorbing efficiency-strain curve at different porosity rates.

the stress-strain curves. The densification strain decreases with the increase of porosity, because in the same pore
size, the larger the porosity, the thinner the cell. When the cell wall reached the same densification in the collapse
process, the larger the porosity and the more strain. The densification points with different pore sizes have no
significant changes in the same porosity, the densification point slightly increased with the increase of cell
diameter.
Table 1 shows the peak stress drop with increasing porosity at different pore size. With the increase of pore
size, porosity increases from 65% to 70%, and the rate of peak stress decrease tends to increase. When the
porosity increases from 70% to 75%, the peak stress reduction rate increases at first and then decreases. When
the aperture is 2 mm, the peak stress reduction rate is low, while when the aperture is 2 mm, the structural
performance is better.
Figure 8 shows that the pore size has a little effect on the compressive properties of aluminum foam. At 65%
porosity, the plateau stress decreased with the increase of the pore size, which is consistent with the previous
research results [15]. According to the yield point in figure 8, when the porosity is 65% (figure 8(a)), the influence
of pore size on compression performance was 4 mm >3 mm >2 mm; When the porosity is 70% (figure 8(b)), the
influence of pore size on compression performance was 2 mm >3 mm >4 mm; the pore size has different effects
at the porosity of 65% and 70%. The strength of.
The foam strength mainly depends on the resistance of the cell wall [30].
At the porosity of 65%, the cell wall thickness is larger, and the number of cell walls per unit volume is less.
The smaller the pore size, the finer the solid framework provided by the aluminum foam, while the larger the
pore size, the thicker the cell walls, and the higher the compressibility, which increases with the increase of pore
size [15]. When the porosity increases to 70%, with the increase of porosity, the number of cell walls per unit
volume increased and the pore walls became thinner. The supporting capacity of the cell wall is weakened.
Therefore, the smaller the pore diameter, the higher the density of pore wall per unit volume and the better
compression characteristics. With the increase of pore size, the density of pore wall per unit volume decreases,
and the compression characteristics decrease. When the porosity reaches 75%, with the further increase of
porosity, the cell wall becomes thinner, as shown in the figure 8(c). The stress-strain curves of 3 mm and 4 mm
pore size are close to each other, pore size have no obvious influence on compressibility, so there is an interaction
between porosity and pore size [15, 31]. The stress-strain curves of aluminum foam with porosity of 70% and
75% with 2 mm cell diameter are stable and longer in length, showing better compression characteristics. Under
different porosity, the pore size has different effects on the compression properties. Under different porosity, the
pore size has different effects on the compression properties.
The mechanical properties of aluminum foam are affected by the interaction between aluminum-matrix
material and pore structure. When the porosity is 65%, the content of aluminum in the sample is relatively high,
and the cell wall played a major role in the overall load capacity. When the porosity is 70%, the content of
aluminum matrix decreases, the pore structure played a major role in the overall load capacity. The mechanical
properties of foamed aluminum with pore size of Ø2 mm are better than the others.

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Mater. Res. Express 8 (2021) 026526 L Sun et al

Figure 10. Ideal energy-absorbing efficiency-strain curve under different pore sizes.

3.3. Ideal energy absorption efficiency

Figure 9 shows the ideal energy absorption efficiency curve of foamed aluminum with different porosity. The
ideal energy absorption efficiency of aluminum foam increased first and then decreased with the strain. When
the strain is less than 0.15, the ideal energy absorption efficiency of foamed aluminum increases with the strain.
When the strain is greater than 0.15, the ideal energy absorption efficiency of foamed aluminum decreases with
the increase of strain. The maximum value of the ideal energy absorption efficiency curve is between 0.7 and 1.2.
The ideal energy absorption efficiency of aluminum foam increases with the increase of porosity, and the
maximum energy absorption efficiency appears in the plastic deformation region.
Figure 10 shows the ideal energy absorption efficiency-strain curve for different pore sizes. The ideal energy
absorption efficiency-strain curve is relatively stable at the 65% porosity. Under the same porosity, the sample
with a pore size of Ø 2 mm shows good ideal energy absorption efficiency. Aluminum matrix materials play a
major role in the process of collapse at the 65% porosity. Porosity of 70% and 75%, the amount of aluminum
matrix materials gradually reduce, the ideal energy absorption efficiency of stress-strain of volatility increases,
but the pore size of Ø 2 mm is the ideal energy absorption efficiency of stress-strain curve fluctuations is
relatively stable, due to the amount of aluminum matrix reduction, pore structure plays a main role. Ø 2 mm
specimen presents a uniform collapse process, which is consistent with the interaction between porosity and cell
diameter in the stress-strain curve.
From the ideal energy-absorbing efficient-strain curve, it can be concluded that the lower the porosity is, the
more stable the energy-absorbing efficiency is, and the smaller the pore size is, the more stable the energy-
absorbing efficiency is. Therefore, aluminum foam with a porosity of 65% and pore size of Ø 2 mm has a
relatively stable energy absorption efficiency.

4. Conclusion

1. Sodium thiosulfate can be used as a new raw material for the preparation of aluminum foam. It has strong
hardness, easy to dissolve in water, low melting point, and can reshape the shape and size of the space
bracket. The aluminum foam with controllable structure can be prepared by the method of space-holding
powder sintering and dissolution.
2. With the increase of porosity, the aluminum content of aluminum foam samples decreased, and the
mechanical properties of aluminum foam increased with the increase of porosity at the same cell diameter.
3. The mechanical properties of aluminum foam are affected by the interaction between aluminum matrix
material and pore structure. From the ideal energy-absorbing efficient-strain curve, it can be concluded that
the lower the porosity is, the more stable the energy-absorbing efficiency is, and the smaller the cell diameter
is, the more stable the energy-absorbing efficiency is.

Acknowledgments

Supported by Natural Science Foundation of Shanxi Province, China (Grant No.201901D111270), Innovation
Project of Teaching Reform in Colleges and Universities in Shanxi Province (Grant No. J2020199) and key R &
D project of Shanxi Province (High-tech), China (Grant No. 201803D121004).

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Data availability statement

The data generated and/or analysed during the current study are not publicly available for legal/ethical reasons
but are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Conflicts of interest

The authors declare that there is no conflict of interest regarding the publication of this paper.

Authors’ contributions

Leilei Sun and Yanli Wang contributed equally to this work.

ORCID iDs

Leilei Sun https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5078-8172

Yanli Wang https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0918-9762
Lucai Wang https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4397-9031

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