Cube recrystallization texture in warm deformed aluminum: understanding and prediction

Abstract

The formation of cube {100}〈001〉 recrystallization texture was studied in warm plane-strain deformed aluminum. Recrystallization cube texture intensity increased from 4 to 200 times random, as the true strain was increased from 0.92 to 3.2. The increased cube was primarily due to larger numbers of recrystallized near cube grains, as cube grains had either no or very limited size advantage over grains of other orientations. The origin of cube nucleation was found in the partial stability of existing cube grains which produced thin bands of near-cube oriented deformed material and the lower stored energy of these cube bands. A simple geometrical model is proposed for the prediction of cube recrystallization texture in plane strain deformed f.c.c. metals. The model predicts the frequency of cube recrystallized grains as: N C d R/ λ C. N C is the number of cube grains per (effective) deformed cube band, d R is the recrystallized grain thickness and λ C is the spacing between effective deformed cube bands — all measured along normal direction. N C values were, in material with a low predeformed cube grain frequency, proposed to be either 1 or 2, based on the deformed microstructure. The spacing, λ C was obtained as ( d o/ a C)(1/exp ε), where d o is the initial grain size, a C is the initial cube grain fraction and ε is the true strain. This model was found to work extremely well for λ C> d R in aluminum.