Study on the post-rolling direction of severely plastic deformed Aluminum-Manganese-Silicon alloy

Constrained groove pressing (CGP) as a severe plastic deformation (SPD) technique was applied on Al-Mn-Si sheets. In the following, direct- and cross-rolling were employed as supplementary processing in order to investigate the rolling-direction effect on CGPed sheets. The in-depth characterization of microstructural evolutions were employed using polarized light microscope and scanning electron microscope. Williamson–Hall analysis method was applied on X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns of specimens. Analysis of XRD results revealed that post-rolling of CGPed sheets induced dynamic recrystallization (DRX) due to massive dislocations’ accumulation which follows by crystallite growth. The largest crystallite size which was 619 nm achieved after direct-rolling through the rolling strain of 1.27. Maximum acquired peak intensity ratio for rolled sheets was for (220) crystallographic plane similar to annealed one. Also, post-rolling had altered the distinguished plane from (111) for CGPed sheets into (220). Mechanical characteristics of specimens were examined using hardness and tension tests. Based on the obtained results, direct-rolling of CGPed samples was more susceptible for strength enhancement compared to cross-rolling. Optimum achieved values for yield and ultimate tensile strength were 155 and 197 MPa, respectively. Rolling in the both longitudinal and cross directions had almost similar effect on the final attained hardness.