Tensile Deformation and Fracture Behavior of a Commercial Al Alloy with Nano-Sized Grains

Abstract

The nano-structure in the commercial 5083 Al alloy was introduced by the equal channel angular pressing technique. The nano-sized grains of ~300 nm were obtained after 8 ECAPs at 373 K and 473 K. It was also obvious that much improvement in strength was obtained at lower pressing temperature, 373 K, than 473 K. In particular, there were mainly two different tensile characteristics; one was that the strength in the alloy ECA pressed at 373 K was much higher than that of as-annealed alloy but the elongation to failure was significantly smaller, while, in case of pressing at 473 K, the improvement in strength was found without sacrificing much of the elongation. The other was that the work hardening with increasing the amount of deformation was found in the alloy ECA pressed at 473 K. These tensile deformation characteristics were analyzed based on the observations of microstructure by TEM and fracture surface by FE-SEM.