Microstructure and mechanical behaviour of semi-solid

Introduction

During the past two decades, magnesium alloy consumption has been increased significantly, especially in the automotive industry due to the requirement to reduce the weight of car components as a result in part of the introduction of legislation limiting emission .The growth rate over the next 10 years has been forecasted to be 7% per annum . However, die-cast Mg components suffer low engineering performance due to the existence of inherent defects, such as porosity, hot cracks and oxide inclusions introduced by the high pressure die-casting (HPDC) process. This has limited the Mg application to the functional components like casings. Further extension of Mg application in the more demanding components requires major development in processing technologies.