Microstructure and mechanical properties of thin magnesium plates and foils obtained by lateral extrusion and rolling at room temperature

A novel processing method was applied for production of thin magnesium plates. At the first step of this procedure, a lateral extrusion (LE) method is involved to form a long magnesium plate. The deformation by LE method was carried out using a hydraulic press, in one pass, at room temperature. As a result of LE, the fine-grained structure with grain size near 8 μm and weakened basal texture occur in the obtained 1-mm magnesium plate. Only small fraction of twins on the planes that are the most typical of magnesium were revealed in the plate. At the next step of processing method, this plate was cold rolled to produce foils of different thicknesses. The microstructure of the foil of 120 μm thick consists of large - 15-20 µm - grains, which have a necklace-like array of ultra-fine grains with a typical size near 2 µm. After rolling to foil of 10 μm thick, any size refinement of the microstructure was not revealed. The elongation-to-failure of 120-µm thick foil at the strain rate 7×10−6 s−1 is more than 20%.