Effect of microalloying with rare-earth on recrystallization behaviour and damping properties of Mg sheets

The effect of a small amount of rare earth elements (RE: Nd and Dy, 0.5 wt.%) on recrystallization behaviour, microstructural evolution and damping properties of deformed Mg sheets have been investigated. The recrystallization behaviour was analyzed in terms of the Johnson-Mehl-Avrami-Kolmogorov model via the variation of microhardness. The Avrami exponent of pure Mg sheet ranged from 1.02 to 1.16, and it was reduced by adding REs. The acceleration of recovery and retardation of recrystallization were detected by the presence of REs. Three point bending was carried out to assess damping properties. At the temperature of ∼150 °C, the damping peak corresponds to grain boundary relaxation, which was affected by grain size, basal texture and the variation of dislocation density on basal plane. At elevated temperatures, a non-thermal activated peak was mainly dependent upon annealing condition, where its height and temperature were increased by adding REs, assigning to be a recrystallization peak.