An investigation into the hot deformation characteristics of 7075 aluminum alloy

The deformation behavior and microstructural evolution of a 7075-T6 aluminum alloy have been investigated through applying hot compression tests at different temperatures and strain rates (450, 500, 520, 550, 580 degrees C and 0.004, 0.04 and 0.4 s(-1)). The peak stress levels in different conditions were extracted from the related true stress-true strain curves. Different dynamic recrystallization (DRX) mechanisms including continuous, discontinuous and geometrical ones were proposed to justify the corresponding results of various thermomechanical processing conditions. Furthermore, the results indicated that the recrystallized structure had been spheroidized in the semi-solid temperature range due to the liquid pressure and their sizes were reduced with increasing the strain rate. (C) 2010 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.