Multipass cold drawing of magnesium alloy minitubes for biodegradable vascular stents

Abstract

Magnesium alloys possess highly limited room-temperature formabilities. This presents a technological barrier to the fabrication of minitubes for biodegradable vascular stents. The research was aimed at developing precision forming technology to fabricate ZM21 magnesium alloy minitubes with a refined microstructure. A multipass cold drawing process with a moving mandrel was successfully developed to convert seamless hollow billets through five passes of cold drawing and an interpass annealing treatment into minitubes with an outside diameter of 2.9mm and a wall thickness of 0.217mm, ready for laser cutting into vascular stents. It was found that a cumulative reduction in cross-section area as much as 32% could be applied to the material without causing fracture. However, a further reduction in cross-section area required annealing at 300°C for 1h to change a twinned microstructure into a recrystallized grain structure and to regain formability. The interpass annealing treatment after the fourth pass led to a reduction in drawing force by 22%, in comparison with the drawing force at the fourth pass of drawing. The variations in the outside diameter and wall thickness of the minitubes could be kept within 5 and 12μm, respectively. Further research is directed toward improvements in dimensional precisions.