Uranium, twice vacuum-melted by electron bombardment to purify it to a level of < 200 ppm of impurities, was cold-rolled to 30–40% reduction, annealed at 340 °C and finally cold-rolled by 90%. The process of transition from the worked to the recrystallised state was followed by measuring resistivity during isothermal or isochronal anneals, by hardness measurements and by X-ray diffraction to seek textural changes. These various techniques led to the conclusion that uranium strongly deformed at 20 °C first undergoes a recovery process. Subsequent recrystallisation proceeds in two stages : formation of grains of uniform size (~ 1 μm) with large mutual misorientations, followed by growth of the larger grains in the manner of secondary recrystallisation. The main change of texture away from the rolling texture occurs during the second state of recrystallisation; this textural change is determined by selective growth of certain grains.