Investigation on the arc erosion behavior of new silver matrix composites: Part II. Reinforced by short fibers

An electroless plating and hot-pressing process was developed to fabricate silver matrix composites reinforced with uniformly distributed graphite and Saffil short fibers (Graphite_sf and Saffil_sf). The hardness of the composites increases as the content of short fibers increase. Static-gap, single-spark erosion and repeated-collision, multiple-arc erosion tests were used to investigate the arc erosion behavior of the composites. The composites exhibited better arc erosion resistance when the contents of short fibers were increased in a static-gap, single-spark erosion test. However, the weight loss of the composites after 10,000 times repeated-collision, multiple-arc erosion operation shows that the composites with low volume percents of short fibers have a good arc erosion resistance. The Saffil_sf/Ag composites show a better arc erosion resistance than Graphite_sf/Ag because of the greater strengthening effect of the finer Saffil short fibers. The erosion behavior of the composites is dominated by the viscosity of composites in single-spark tests, while it depends on the competition of viscosity and thermal properties in multiple-arc tests.