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Hydrostatic tube cyclic expansion extrusion process is a newly invented severe plastic deformation technique for producing long ultrafine-grained and nanostructured tubes with higher mechanical properties. In the present research, this process was applied through two passes at room temperature on the commercial purity copper. Then, the hardness, tensile properties, fracture surface and microstructure of the samples were evaluated. The main goal of this research was to achieve a material with a simultaneous high strength and desirable ductility. In this process, the utilization of pressurized fluid between the die and the tube leads to first, the desired improvement of mechanical properties due to the effects of hydrostatic compressive stress. Second, the reduction of a required deforming force to eliminating the friction between the die and the tube leads to the facilitation of producing relatively long ultrafine-grained and nanostructured tubes. After two passes of process, a nearly equiaxed and homogeneous ultrafine-grained (UFG) microstructure was observed. The yield strength and ultimate strength increased from 75 MPa and 207 MPa to 310 MPa and 386 MPa, respectively. However, elongation to failure decreased from 55% to 37%. Also, the hardness value of the tube increased significantly from 59 Hv to 143 Hv, and the uniform distribution of hardness was obtained through the thickness of the tube. The fractography evaluations revealed that the predominantly ductile fracture happened in all samples of tensile testing. The hydrostatic tube cyclic expansion extrusion process can be utilized as a practical industrial method for producing relatively long ultrafine-grained tubes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The main goal of this study is achieving thin-walled AZ31 magnesium alloy tubes with high ductility at elevated temperature. For this purpose, a combined severe plastic deformation method, including parallel tubular channel angular pressing (PTCAP) and tube backward extrusion (TBE) was used. First, PTCAP process was applied on tubular samples at 300°C and then, TBE process was performed at 300°C. After PTCAP, a necklace like microstructure, large gains surrounded by a large number of tiny recrystallized ones, was observed and the average grain size of the material decreased from 520 µm to 11.1 µm. At the next stage, After TBE, an ultra-fine grain microstructure with an average grain size of 8.6 µm was formed. After performing this combined method, the hardness value of the PTCAP and TBE processed sample increased from 37 HV to 69 HV. Hot tensile testing studies at 300°C revealed an elongation to failure value of 181% for the PTCAP and TBE processed sample, while this value for as-received sample was 55%. Fractographic SEM images showed that predominately ductile fracture was occurred in all hot tensile specimens due to nucleation of microvoids and their subsequent growth and coalescence with each other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this study, the effect of Parallel tubular channel angular pressing (PTCAP) as a severe plastic deformation (SPD) process on the microstructural, mechanical properties and superplasticity of AZ31 magnesium alloy were investigated. PTCAP method at 300°C was performed for production of ultrafine grained (UFG) tube with a high superplasticity. After the first pass of PTCAP a bimodal microstructure, large gains surrounded by a large number of tiny recrystallized ones, was observed. The grain refinement and homogeneity of the microstructure increased by applying subsequent passes of PTCAP. After four pass of PTCAP, the average grain size of the material decreased from 43 μm to 6.8 μm. Vickers microhardness measurements revealed that by applying more PTCAP passes and consequently, more grain refinement, the value of hardness increased. Fractographic SEM images showed that predominately ductile fracture was occurred in all hot tensile specimens. A higher elongation to failure of 256% was achieved at a higher tensile testing temperature of 450°C and a strain rate of 10-3 1/s, due to grain boundary sliding as a dominant deformation mechanism, while this values for the as-received sample is 116% at the same tensile testing condition. Finally, it was observed that the four-pass PTCAP processed sample has higher room temperature microstructural and mechanical properties and also higher elevated temperature superplasticity than the as-received sample. Also, the grains thermal stability test was done on the four-pass PTCAP processed sample at 5 different temperatures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]