Tag: aluminum advantages

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6 Reasons to Choose Aluminum Over Carbon Fiber

6 Reasons To Choose Aluminum Over Carbon Fiber

What are the reasons to choose aluminum over carbon fiber?

  1. Price
  2. Availability
  3. Durability
  4. Repairable
  5. Recyclable
  6. Heat resistance

 

With the growing popularity of carbon fiber in various industries and a wide range of markets, it may not be as easily accessible as one of the most popular lightweight and strong materials as an alternative. In the Philippines, aluminum is still widely used in the fabrication of bicycles and car parts. Though carbon fiber may seem like a good choice for fabrication, aluminum still has its advantages over composites such as carbon fiber.

 

Price

Without a doubt, if you’re looking for a cost-effective way to make use of a lightweight material that has a great strength to weight ratio, aluminum would be the way to go. On the market, it may not be practical to choose carbon fiber over aluminum if your quest for lightweight and strength in materials will take a toll on your wallet. Carbon fiber costs almost 5 times the price of aluminum.

With all the perks you get from aluminum, every pound of this metal is well worth your money. Transportation, construction, electrical devices, and consumer goods reap the benefits of aluminum’s cost-effectiveness due to its amazing physical properties and for how much it’s worth.

 

Availability

Availability

Before the World War, aluminum was difficult to come by. This scarcity meant that aluminum was once an expensive material. But after the war, the world suddenly had a massive surplus of aluminum. Today, you can easily purchase aluminum. In the Philippines, there are dozens of aluminum shops in almost every city.

Everywhere you go, you can find aluminum. Its commonness is why many people choose to use aluminum as a material compared to carbon fiber. Many race car drivers would choose to make their body panels out of aluminum due to its wide availability and of course, its cost as well. Metal suppliers such as One Sky Philippines will always have aluminum ready for you to purchase.

 

Durability

Compared to carbon fiber, aluminum does a better job at receiving forces from different directions. It is true that carbon fiber has a higher shock resistance than aluminum but it is only meant to receive force from one direction. When sudden force is applied at a direction that carbon fiber is not meant to handle, it will break. Aluminum, on the other hand, is isotropic; that means that the physical properties of aluminum have the same measurement in all direction. In simple terms, aluminum has higher structural durability when receiving forces from any direction.

Of course, both materials have a shock limit. The downside of carbon fiber reaching its shock threshold is that it shatters. When aluminum receives the same amount of force, it will bend under its limit. This makes it ideal for aluminum to be used for aircrafts and automobiles as they are likely to deflect certain objects during their travels. They cannot risk parts from shattering as it would compromise safety.

 

Repairable

Repairable

This one of the major reasons to choose aluminum over carbon fiber. As discussed earlier, aluminum will bend under its shock limit. When it does, it is easy to repair and reshape back into its original form without sacrificing its rigidity. It’s one of aluminum’s best properties. When carbon fiber shatters, its original structure cannot be repaired. Though the composite can be reused, it would take much more effort to construct another carbon part.

This makes aluminum ideal for trail bicycles and underbody aerodynamic components for race cars. As these are often subjected to extensive abuse and will likely receive impacts. Repairing them would be easier than having to spend more to replace the whole thing.

 

Recyclable

Aluminum is 100% recyclable. Though carbon fiber can be reused. Shattered pieces of composite would mean a loss in the overall mass of carbon fiber. While broken aluminum can simply be re-melted and formed back to shape via forging or casting. Re-shaped aluminum maintains the same physical properties of its original structure. Only 5 percent of energy is required to recycle aluminum in the whole recycling process.

 

Heat Resistance

Heat Resistance

Aluminum is capable of resisting extremely hot and cold temperatures. Under higher temperatures, carbon fiber degrades at a quicker rate, causing it to potentially deform under immense heat. In cold temperatures, carbon fiber can shatter easily. Under subzero temperatures, the tensile strength of aluminum slightly increases. Many aluminum alloys are ideal for structures in cold temperatures. Aluminum is known to withstand extreme heat and has a melting point of 660 degrees Celsius.

 

Key Takeaway

Aluminum is a top choice for those who are seeking to make use of this strong and lightweight material, without having to pay 5 times more for carbon fiber. You can achieve the same goal with aluminum alloys. It is a practical choice for those who want to build race cars, structures, and other components. Companies like One Sky Philippines can offer a wide range of aluminum materials.

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The Aluminum Advantage: Properties of the Miracle Metal

The Aluminum Advantage - Properties of the Miracle Metal

What properties does aluminum have that make it the miracle metal?

  1. Lightweight
  2. Strong and durable
  3. Conductive
  4. Ductile
  5. Corrosion resistant
  6. Recyclable

 

 

There are more than a couple hundred aluminum providers and manufacturers in the entire world like One Sky Aluminum. One reason for the overwhelming number of people building their business off of aluminum is the metal’s abundance.

Aluminum is the most abundant metal and the 3rd most abundant element in the earth’s crust as it makes up approximately 8% of it. However, it is never found free in nature. Aluminum is always combined with other elements to form compounds such as aluminum oxide and potassium aluminum sulfate.

At first, extracting aluminum from these compounds was costly and labor-intensive which meant it was a luxury item in the early 1800s. As years went by and technology advanced, scientist found an easier and inexpensive way of obtaining aluminum. All this resulted in the increased availability of affordable and high-quality aluminum – another reason why it’s so widely used to this day.

Besides its abundance and affordability, there’s another thing that makes aluminum worthy of the title “the miracle metal”—its properties. What these properties are and how they make aluminum such an ideal material will be listed and explained below!

 

 

Lightweight

Lightweight

The specific weight of aluminum is 2.7g/cm3 and that is about a third of the weight of steel, which makes aluminum a very lightweight metal. In some products, this is just an advantage but for others, this is an important and crucial detail.

Using aluminum in vehicles, for example, reduces dead-weight and lowers energy consumption while simultaneously increasing load capacity. Being lightweight also means that the shipping and handling costs are lowered which ultimately leads to cheaper production costs.

 

 

Strong and Durable

Aluminum isn’t just used for day to day products like kitchen utensils or soda cans, it is also trusted for some of the most extreme uses because of its high-strength and durability. Some of the many sectors that make good use of aluminum include the automotive industry, military forces, aviation, and even NASA.

The secret to aluminum’s strength is chemistry. When pure aluminum is mixed with other elements, it makes high-strength alloys that can be further strengthened through different processing techniques. This results in a finished product that is just as strong, if not stronger, than steel.

 

 

Conductive

In relation to its weight, aluminum is almost twice as good of an electrical conductor as copper. It’s innate and excellent electric conductivity makes it a very economical material for power transmission cables, electric bulbs, and other electric fields and applications.

Aside from being a good conductor of electricity, aluminum is also a great conductor of heat. In fact, it conducts heat better than all other common metals and is three times as conductive as steel. This is a property that is important in heat exchange applications which are commonly used in the petroleum, chemical, automotive, and food industries.

 

 

Ductile

Ductile

Ductility is a physical property that is associated with a material’s ability to be hammered thin or stretched wide without breaking and one very good example of a ductile metal is aluminum.

As a material, aluminum can very easily be fabricated into different forms and designs like sheets, shapes, rods, tubes, and wires. Because of this, products made from aluminum can be formed close to the end of the manufacturing process.

 

 

Corrosion Resistant

Aluminum is corrosion resistant because it generates a protective coating on its surface called aluminum oxide. This protective layer prevents the metal underneath from coming into contact with potential corroders like air and oxygen.

Even when the surface of the aluminum is scratched, the aluminum oxide layer will rapidly reform and retain protection. Moreover, this protective layer can be further improved through different types of surface treatments like painting or lacquering.

Possessing such a property makes aluminum particularly useful for constructing buildings and household utensils.

 

 

Recyclable

One of the most impressive properties of aluminum is its sustainability – it is a 100% recyclable and sustainable metal. There is a secondary metal sector within the aluminum industry that re-melts scrapped aluminum products and recovers the metal in it. There is no downside to this since only 5% of the energy required to produce new aluminum is needed in the recycling process.

On top of this, the basic use of aluminum lowers energy cost and carbon emissions in many applications similar to how cars made from aluminum function more efficiently and environmentally-friendly.

It doesn’t stop there, though, the aluminum industry is still making improvements in the primary and secondary processes of making aluminum to make it more environmentally efficient.

 

 

Key Takeaway

There are many reasons aluminum is such a widely used product but most of it boils down to its many amazing properties which got it the title of “the miracle metal.” It is lightweight, strong and durable, conductive, ductile, corrosion resistant, and recyclable.

These properties make for a versatile material that gives manufacturers like One Sky Aluminum a wide range of options in terms of product innovation and process improvements.