I need an extruded AL material suggestion

[wz07bw]

Folks,

I am working on an application like a big drawer slide. The slides are intended to be aluminum with steel balls running directly on them.

Can anyone suggest an aluminum which would maximize the longevity of the slides and the contact stress issues.

In addition this may be subjected to road salt and water environment.

My extruder has suggested 6082T6. We made the prototypes in 6005T5.

Any suggestions would be great. Thanks in advance.

Jim

 

[TVP]

6005-T5 is not a good choice. It doesn't sound like any aluminum alloy will be a good choice if the contact stresses will be high, the number of cycles will be high, and/or the environment (salt, water) removes any lubricant. 6061-T6 or 6082-T6 with a dry film lubricant may be acceptable from a general strength and corrosion standpoint, and perhaps will have reasonable friction/wear properties. I would not suggest any of the 2xxx or conventioanl 7xxx series (meaning 7075) alloys due to corrosion issues, even though they offer considerably higher strength. Maybe one of the lean 7xxx series alloys like 7129-T6, which is used for bumper beams (yield ~ 380 MPa, UTS ~ 430 MPa, El ~ 15%).

 

[arunmrao]

Hardened steel balls rolling on aluminium will be like a knife on butter. This will not be a long lasting solution.Though I have seen major hardware suppliers for wardrobe,kitchen storage solutions etc offering this combination as midway solution. The lower end being powder coated steel and upper end stainless steel.

I have not failed. I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work." — Thomas Edison
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[CoryPad]

How about hard anodized Al for improved wear resistance? Adding dry film lube after anodizing would be even better.

 

[ornerynorsk]

7075 would not be a bad choice. Once it's anodized, which would help for corrosion and wear. I've seen applications like slides use this arrangement.

 

[wz07bw]

Thanks folks we'll proceed with a couple of ideas.

 

[DAVIDSTECKER]

You might want to look at the coatings from General Magnaplate.
They have some very hard coatings and I believe some have lubricating materials in them as well.