Deformation and fracture behavior of Cu and CuSi alloys under dynamic loading conditions

Abstract

An exploding wire system for dynamic loading has been used to study the influence of stacking fault energy on the deformation and fracture behavior of CuSi alloys containing up to 3.3 wt.% Si. Transmission electron microscopy examination of the dynamically loaded alloys revealed substructures similar to those observed in plate impact loaded specimens of copper-base alloys of comparable stacking fault energy. The deformation structure and the corresponding hardness of the dynamically loaded alloys exhibited the most dramatic change when the stacking fault energy was varied over the range between 25 and 50 erg/cm 2 (2.5 × 10 −2 and 5.0 × 10 −2 J m −2). The results indicate that the hardness increase resulting from a given shock pressure and strain rate is much greater for the exploding wire configuration when compared with plate impact loading for specimens of comparable stacking fault energy. The implications of this observation are discussed.