Solid-state recycling of aluminium alloy swarf through cold profile extrusion and cold rolling

In this study, the possibility of solid-state recycling of aluminium alloy machining swarf using cold extrusion and a subsequent cold rolling process is investigated. Cast Al–Si alloy swarf was cold compacted into billets and successfully profile-extruded into square bars with a rectangular cross-sectional aspect ratio of 1:1.8 under an extrusion ratio of 4 or more. After annealing, the extruded bars underwent multi-pass cold rolling into 1-mm thick strips with a total rolling reduction of 85%. Optical microscopy demonstrated that in material recycled using only an extrusion process, coarse residual voids existed in regions where insufficient plastic strain was introduced, causing a visible expansion of the material during heat treatment. However, uniaxial tensile tests showed that extrusion-recycled material had a higher mechanical strength than the original aluminium alloy, implying sufficient bonding among the individual pieces of machining swarf. It was also found that the strength and density of material recycled through extrusion and an additional rolling process were superior to material recycled using extrusion only. Moreover, it was observed that the ductility of the recycled materials was inferior to that of the original aluminium alloy.