A new concept for producing ultrafine-grained metallic structures via an intermediate strain rate: Experiments and modeling

A novel experimental methodology to produce ultrafine-grained metallic microstructures, which is applied on aluminum is proposed in this work. In fact, the ultrafine-grained aluminum polycrystal is made from commercial purity powder by a combination of hot isostatic pressing (HIP) and dynamic severe plastic deformation (DSPD). After the first step, the bulk consolidated material showed a random texture and homogeneous microstructure of equiaxed grains with an average size of 2 μm. The material is then subsequently impacted, using a falling weight at a maximum impact velocity of 9.2 m/sec. The resulting material shows a microstructure having an average grain size of about 500 nm with a strong gradient of fiber-like crystallographic texture perpendicular to the impact direction. The mechanical properties of the impacted material are then characterized under compression tests at room temperature under a strain rate of 10−4 s−1. The effect of the change of the deformation path on the mechanical response parallel and perpendicular to the impact direction is also investigated. These results are discussed in relation with microstructure. Further, a new extension of a micromechanical approach developed by Abdul-Latif et al., [2] is proposed to predict the grain size effect on the enhancement of the mechanical strength of polycrystals. Within the framework of small strain hypothesis, the elastic anisotropy of the grain and grain rotation are neglected for the sake of simplicity. The local inelastic deformation heterogeneity is determined through the slip theory. It is assumed that the yield strength increases linearly with decreasing grain size as in Hall–Petch relationship. It is obviously recognized that the model with its new extension describes fairly well the effect of the grain size on the strain–stress behavior of the sub-micrometer aluminum.