Cold rolling behaviour of an austenitic, Fe-30Mn-3Al-3Si TWIP-steel: the importance of deformation twinning

The present paper deals with the evolution of microstructure and texture of a TWIP-steel during cold rolling. With increasing strains. different deformation mechanisms become active. TEM observations show the presence of deformation twinning at low strains (epsilon < 0.1). As the strain increases the Volume fraction of twins increases. At higher strain levels. non-homogeneous deformation mechanisms such Lis shear band formation become active. This evolution of the microstructure is reflected in the formation of the texture. The brass orientation {1 1 0}<1 1 2> is dominant at every strain level, Its intensity increases as strain increases, while additional texture components develop at different strain levels: the E {1 1 1}<1 1 0> and F orientation {1 1 1}<1 1 2> as well Lis the S orientation {1 2 3}<6 3 4>. Compared to these orientations the copper orientation intensity remains rather low. (C) 2004 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.