Continuous dynamic recrystallization in a superplastic 7075 aluminum alloy

Abstract

New grain evolution taking place during superplasticity was studied by means of tensile tests as well as metallographic observation for a unrecrystallized coarse-grained 7075 aluminum alloy. Grain boundary sliding (GBS) frequently takes place even on the layered high angle boundaries (HABs) parallel to the tensile axis and brings about rotation of subgrains near the HABs and subsequently in grain interiors. The misorientations of (sub)grain boundaries evolved in the pancaked grains increase accompanied by a randomization of the initial texture, followed by development of new grains with HABs. This indicates that unrecrystallized and pancaked grain structure developed by cold rolling is an important prerequisite not only for the appearance of superplasticity, hut also for the dynamic evolution of new fine grains. It is concluded that the mechanism of new grain evolution can be a deformation-induced continuous reaction, that is continuous dynamic recrystallization (CDRX). A model for CDRX is discussed in detail comparing with previous several models.