3D-characterisation of microstructure evolution during annealing of a deformed aluminum single crystal

The microstructure within a 31) volume of a deformed Al single crystal is studied by a novel diffraction method before and after annealing for 5 min at 300 degreesC. The 99.996% pure single crystal of the S-orientation was channel die deformed to a strain of epsilon=1.5, producing a cell-block structure with distances of about 1 mum between dislocation boundaries. By means of micro-focused hard X-rays from a synchrotron the orientations within a volume of 0.2 x 0.2 x 2 mm(3) were mapped non-destructively. Cells or cell-blocks with orientations far from those of the principal poles can be identified individually with a resolving limit of 0.6 mum. The diffraction pattern related to these parts of the orientation distribution show little correlation between the as-deformed and annealed states. They indicate the emergence of recovered cells and/or nuclei with orientations not present in the deformed state. (C) 2003 Acta Materialia Inc. Published by Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.