Grain Refinement and Texture Evolution of an AA5052 Aluminum Alloy during Flow Forming

The effects of thickness reduction on the microstructure and mechanical properties of an AA5052 aluminum alloy were investigated in this work during flow forming at room temperature. The AA5052 alloy demonstrated good flow formability when the thickness reduction was less than 60% per pass with a spindle speed of 400 rpm and a feed rate of 0.1 mm/rev. The equiaxed grains were first elongated along the axial direction and then divided into several finer grains with increasing thickness reduction. In addition, the microstructure became uniform and refined when the thickness reduction reached 50%. The initial texture transformed from Cube {001}<100> and Goss {110}<001> components to F {111}<112> and P {110}<221> components after a 10% thickness reduction. The F {111}<112> and P {110}<221> components continued to intensify with increasing thickness reduction. Correspondingly, the yield and tensile strengths of the AA5052 alloy increased from 103 and 225 MPa to 300 and 328 MPa, respectively, when the thickness reduction reached 90%. These experimental results illustrated that the improvement in mechanical properties could be attributed to grain refinement and texture evolution.