Influence of precipitation on the Portevin-Le Chatelier effect in Al-Mg alloys

In the alloy with solute content higher than the limiting solubility, the solute atoms that have failed to dissolve will precipitate from the solid solution and form precipitations. In this study, the Portevin-Le Chatelier (PLC) effects in annealed 5456 and 5052 aluminum alloys with different precipitation contents have been investigated under different applied strain rates. The results suggest that precipitations have significant effect on the PLC effect and the more the precipitations are, the greater the influence is. Furthermore, the solute diffusion is pipe diffusion in 5052 alloy with lower precipitation content. However, for 5456 alloy with higher precipitation content, the diffusion is no longer the case but more complex. (C) 2011 The Chinese Society of Theoretical and Applied Mechanics.