Mechanical and electrical responses of nanostructured Cu-3 wt%Ag alloy fabricated by ECAP and cold rolling

This paper investigated the mechanical and electrical responses of nanostructured Cu-3 wt%Ag alloy as a function of the strain imposed by a combination of equal channel angular pressing and subsequent cold rolling. The influence of cold rolling on the microstructural change was observed to be pronounced, resulting in the occurrence of lamellar band structure. Room-temperature tension tests results revealed that, as the amount of strain increased, the tensile strength of the nanostructured Cu-3 wt%Ag alloy increased while losing its ductility. The electrical conductivity slightly decreased with increasing amount of strain imposed. This phenomenon was mainly attributed to the nano-grained structure together with the non-equilibrium state of the grain boundaries. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.