Microstructure evolution of 7050 aluminum alloy during hot deformation

Hot compression of 7050 aluminum alloy was performed on Gleeble 1500D thermo-mechanical simulator at 350°C and 450°C with a constant strain rate of 0.1 s−1 to different nominal strains of 0.1, 0.3 and 0.7. Microstructures of 7050 alloy under various compression conditions were observed by TEM to investigate the microstructure evolution process of the alloy deformed at various temperatures. The microstructure evolves from dislocation tangles to cell structure and subgrain structure when being deformed at 350°C, of which dynamic recovery is the softening mechanism. However, continuous dynamic recrystallization (DRX) occurs during hot deformation at 450°C, in which the main nucleation mechanisms of DRX are subgrain growth and subgrain coalescence rather than particle-simulated nucleation (PSN).