Stress-induced phase transformation characteristics and its effect on the enhanced ductility in continuous columnar-grained polycrystalline Cu-12 wt % Al alloy

The microstructure evolution and stress-induced phase transformation (SIPT) characteristics of continuous columnar-grained (CCG) polycrystalline Cu-12 wt % Al alloy during the tensile deformation process were investigated to understand the ductility enhancement mechanism, which shows a tensile elongation of 28%, nine times as high as that of the conventional as-cast polycrystalline counterpart. The results show that the CCG alloy has highly-oriented < 001 >beta texture and straight low-energy grain boundaries (GBs) along solidification direction, which significantly promote grains compatibility during plastic deformation. Additionally, besides beta(1)' -> alpha(1)' transformation, beta(1)' -> gamma(1)' -> alpha(1)' SIPT was also observed simultaneously in the CCG polycrystalline Cu-12 wt % Al alloy, which is different from single crystalline and conventional polycrystalline counterparts. As a consequence of the special phase transformations, high phase transformation plasticity (15-20%) and prominent subsequent plastic deformation (8-13%) of the phase transformation product alpha(1)' martensite can be obtained. (C) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.