Accumulative Roll Bonding and Post-Deformation Annealing of Cu-Al-Mn Shape Memory Alloy

Abstract

Accumulative roll bonding is a severe plastic deformation process used for Cu-Al-Mn shape memory alloy. The main purpose of this study is to investigate the possibility of grain refinement of Cu-9.5Al-8.2Mn (in wt.%) shape memory alloy using accumulative roll bonding and post-deformation annealing. The alloy was successfully subjected to 5 passes of accumulative roll bonding at 600 °C. The microstructure, properties as well as post-deformation annealing of this alloy were investigated by optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, x-ray diffraction, differential scanning calorimeter, and bend and tensile testing. The results showed that after 5 passes of ARB at 600 °C, specimens possessed α + β microstructure with the refined grains, but martensite phases and consequently shape memory effect completely disappeared. Post-deformation annealing was carried out at 700 °C, and the martensite phase with the smallest grain size (less than 40 μm) was obtained after 150 s of annealing at 700 °C. It was found that after 5 passes of ARB and post-deformation annealing, the stability of SME during thermal cycling improved. Also, tensile properties of alloys significantly improved after post-deformation annealing.