Models for predicting temperature dependence of material properties of aluminum

A number of processes such as laser ablation, laser welding, electric discharge machining, etc involve high temperatures. Most of the processes involve temperatures much higher than the target melting and normal boiling point. Such large variation in target temperature causes a significant variation in its material properties. Due to the unavailability of experimental data on material properties at elevated temperatures, usually the data at lower temperatures is often erroneously extrapolated during modelling of these processes. Therefore, this paper attempts to evaluate the variation in material properties with temperature using some general and empirical theories, along with the available experimental data for aluminum. The evaluated properties of Al using the proposed models show a significant variation with temperature. Between room temperature and near-critical temperature (0.9T(c)), surface reflectivity of Al varies from more than 90% to less than 50%, absorption coefficient decreases by a factor of 7, thermal conductivity decreases by a factor of 5, density decreases by a factor of 4, specific heat and latent heat of vapourization vary by a factor between 1.5 and 2. Applying these temperature-dependent material properties for modelling laser ablation suggest that optical properties have a greater influence on the process than thermophysical properties. The numerical predictions of the phase explosion threshold in laser ablation are within 5% of the experimental values.