Effect of heating rate on mechanical property, microstructure and texture evolution of Al-Mg-Si-Cu alloy during solution treatment

The effect of heating rate on the mechanical properties, microstructure and texture of Al-Mg-Si-Cu alloy during solution treatment was investigated through tensile testing, scanning electron microscope, scanning transmission electron microscope, metallographic observation and EBSD measurement. The experimental results reveal that there are great differences in the mechanical properties, microstructures and textures after the solution treatment with two different heating rates. Compared with the alloy sheet solution treated with slow heating rate, the alloy sheet solution treated with rapid heating rate possesses weak mechanical property anisotropy and higher average r value. The equiaxed grain is the main recrystallization microstructure for the case of rapid heating rate, while the elongated grain appears in the case of slow heating rate. The texture components are also quite different in the two cases, CubeND orientation is the main texture component for the former case, while the latter one includes Cube, R, Goss, P and Brass orientations. The relationship between r value, texture components and microstructure has also been established in this paper.