Light-metal foams: Some recent developments

Metallic foams have now reached the maturity of development in terms of process stability, materials properties and costs required for industrial applications. The fine-tuning of the manufacturing process carried out in the past few years has been responsible for this success. Nowadays, Al foam panels as large as 2.5 m × 1.5 m in area and having a uniform pore structure are commercially available. In parallel to this development, new processing routes are being explored, including foaming with novel blowing agents, foaming by application of under-pressure, foaming of scrap and of other metals such as magnesium. Some of the steps of these developments are reviewed.