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In this work, forming limit diagram for aluminum alloy 3105 is performed experimentally using out of plane test. In addition, using ductile fracture criteria and finite element simulation, forming limit diagram of aluminum alloy 3105 is performed numerically. Finally, it is shown that the results obtained from numerical prediction are in good agreement with experimental results.
Friction stir welding is a solid state joining process with relatively low welding temperatures. Nevertheless, the mechanical properties of friction stir welded blanks are degraded after welding. Indeed, both strength and ductility of the welds are decreased after welding. Often, the resulting friction stir welded blanks need to be formed to their final structural shape. Therefore, the formability of friction stir welded blanks is of primary importance in the manufacturing of structural parts. This paper studies how the mechanical properties and particularly formability of friction stir welded blanks can be improved by applying a post weld heat treatment. Two aluminum alloys from 2000 and 7000 series, namely 2024-T3 and 7075-T6, are selected for the study. The sheet thickness of both materials is 2,0 mm. The selected alloys are welded in three configurations: 2024-T3 and 2024-T3, 7075-T6 and 7075-T6, and 2024-T3 and 7075-T6. The resulting welds are naturally aged for a few months. Three sets of standard dog bone shape tensile test specimens are then machined from the welds. The first set of the specimens is tested without any heat treatment. The second set of the specimens is solution heat treated and quenched before testing. The third set of the specimens is solution heat treated, quenched, and naturally aged for a week before testing. The mechanical properties of the three different sets of specimens are compared with each other. It is shown that careful selection of post weld heat-treatment can greatly improve the formability of friction stir welded blanks.
Mild steel is low carbon steel content of carbon less than 0.25 wt%. This type of steels is low cost to produce while has good toughness and outstanding ductility. Nanocoated mild steel surface is greatly many applications such as in automobile body component, pipelines, wall of operation's room and operation's theatre. Anatase TiO{sub 2} coating were successfully synthesized by optimize the sol-gel solution wherein glacial acetic acid and controlling of annealing temperature. In this paper initial study of TiO{sub 2} nanocoating on mild steel surface was presented. TiO{sub 2} nanocoating was prepared by spin coating technique. Spin coating technique is low processing temperature and ease of compositional modifications. The sol-gel concentration and speed (rpm) of spin coating were varied to produce different surface morphology and topology of samples. The surface phase, morphology and topology of coating were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy (FESEM) and Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) while the roughness of coating was determined by Surface Profiler (SP).
Formability of steel and aluminium alloys in hot stamping and cold die quenching processes is studied in this research. Viscoplastic-damage constitutive equations are developed and determined from experimental data for the prediction of viscoplastic flow and ductility of the materials. The determined unified constitutive equations are then implemented into the commercial Finite Element code Abaqus/Explicit via a user defined subroutine, VUMAT. An FE process simulation model and numerical procedures are established for the modeling of hot stamping processes for a spherical part with a central hole. Different failure modes (failure takes place either near the central hole or in the mid span of the part) are obtained. To validate the simulation results, a test programme is developed, a test die set has been designed and manufactured, and tests have been carried out for the materials with different forming rates. It has been found that very close agreements between experimental and numerical process simulation results are obtained for the ranges of temperatures and forming rates carried out.
Magnesium alloys have higher specific strength compared with other metals, such as aluminum, copper and steel. Nevertheless, their ductility is still not good for further metal forming and their strength is not large enough for real structure applications. The aim of this paper is to develop magnesium alloy composite tubes reinforced with SiC particulates by the stir-casting method and hot extrusion processes. At first, AZ61/SiCp composite ingots reinforced with 5 wt% SiC particulates are fabricated by the melt-stirring technique. Then, finite element simulations are conducted to analyze the plastic flow of magnesium alloy AZ61 within the die and the temperature distribution of the products. AZ61/SiCp composite tubes are manufactured by hot extrusion using a specially designed die-set for obtaining uniform thickness distribution tubes. Finally, the mechanical properties of the reinforced AZ61/SiCp composite and Mg alloy AZ61 tubes are compared with those of the billets to manifest the advantages of extrusion processes and reinforcement of SiC particulates. The microstructures of the billet and extruded tubes are also observed. Through the improvement of the strength of the tube product, its life cycle can be extended and the energy consumption can be reduced, and eventually the environmental sustainability is achieved.
Grain boundaries (GBs) are known to play an important role in determining the mechanical and functional properties of nanocrystalline materials. In this study, we used molecular dynamics simulations to investigate the effects of damaged GBs on the mechanical properties of SiC that is irradiated by 10 keV Si atoms. The results reveal that irradiation promotes GB sliding and reduces the ability of GBs to block dislocations, which improves the deformation ability of nanocrystalline SiC. However, irradiation causes local rearrangements in disordered clusters and pinning of dislocations in the grain region, which restrains its deformation. These two mechanisms arise from the irradiation effects on GBs and grains, and these mechanisms compete in nanocrystalline SiC during irradiation. The irradiation effects on GBs dominate at low irradiation doses, and the effects on grains dominate at high doses; the result of these combined effects is a peak ductility of 0.09 dpa in nanocrystalline SiC.
A general nano-mechanical test platform capable of performing variable temperature and variable strain rate testing in situ in the scanning electron microscope is described. A variety of test geometries are possible in combination with focused ion beam machining or other fabrication techniques: indentation, micro-compression, cantilever bending, and scratch testing. The system is intrinsically displacement-controlled, which allows it to function directly as a micro-scale thermomechanical test frame. Stable, elevated temperature indentation/micro-compression requires the indenter tip and the sample to be in thermal equilibrium to prevent thermal displacement drift due to thermal expansion. This is achieved through independent heating and temperature monitoring of both the indenter tip and sample. Furthermore, the apex temperature of the indenter tip is calibrated, which allows it to act as a referenced surface temperature probe during contact. A full description of the system is provided, and the effects of indenter geometry and of radiation on imaging conditions are discussed. The stabilization time and temperature distribution throughout the system as a function of temperature is characterized. The advantages of temperature monitoring and thermal calibration of the indenter tip are illustrated, which include the possibility of local thermal conductivity measurement. Finally, validation results using nanoindentation on fused silica and micro-compression of <100> silicon micro-pillars as a function of temperature up to 500 Degree-Sign C are presented, and procedures and considerations taken for these measurements are discussed. A brittle to ductile transition from fracture to splitting then plastic deformation is directly observed in the SEM for silicon as a function of temperature.
Iron aluminides based on FeAl is notable for their low materials cost, ease of fabrication and good corrosion, suffixation and oxidation resistance. However, the application based on these unique properties still require the development of Fe-Al based alloy since it shows some drawbacks such as a lack of high temperature strength and low ductility. To improve the mechanical properties of FeAl based alloy, ceria (CeO{sub 2}) will be added to this compound. FeAl based alloy produced by the mechanical alloying (MA) technique. The developed specimens then assessed with respect to oxidation behaviour in high temperature, scale microstructure and hardness. The surface morphologies of the alloy evaluated and observed using scanning electron microscopy (SEM) with an energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDX). The phase structures of oxide scale formed on them were identified by X-ray diffraction (XRD). The results found that the FeAl intermetallic compound containing CeO{sub 2} 0.5 wt.% is less pores and CeO{sub 2} 1.0 wt.% is more homogen in powder and solid form, higher hardness and increase in their resistance to oxidation behaviour in high temperature compared with another percentage of CeO{sub 2}.
Nanotwinned metals received significant interest lately as twin boundaries may enable simultaneous enhancement of strength, ductility, thermal stability, and radiation tolerance. However, nanotwins have been the privilege of metals with low-to-intermediate stacking fault energy (SFE). Recent scattered studies show that nanotwins could be introduced into high SFE metals, such as Al. In this paper, we examine several sputter-deposited, (111) textured Ag/Al, Cu/Ni, and Cu/Fe multilayers, wherein growth twins were observed in Al, Ni, and face-centered cubic (fcc) Fe. The comparisons lead to two important design criteria that dictate the introduction of growth twins in high SFE metals. The validity of these criteria was then examined in Ag/Ni multilayers. Furthermore, another twin formation mechanism in high SFE metals was discovered in Ag/Ni system.
To reduce weight and improve passenger safety there is an increased need in the automotive industry to use Ultra High Strength Steels (UHSS) for structural and crash components. However, the application of UHSS is restricted by their limited formability and the difficulty of forming them in conventional processes. An alternative method of manufacturing structural auto body parts from UHSS is the flexible roll forming process which can accommodate materials with high strength and limited ductility in the production of complex and weight-optimised components. However, one major concern in the flexible roll forming is web-warping, which is the height deviation of the profile web area. This paper investigates, using a numerical model, the effect on web-warping with respect to various forming methods. The results demonstrate that different forming methods lead to different amount of web-warping in terms of forming the product with identical geometry.
It is shown that inverse problems of steady-state creep bending of plates in both the geometrically linear and nonlinear formulations can be represented in a variational formulation. Steady-state values of the obtained functionals corresponding to the solutions of the problems of inelastic deformation and springback are determined by applying a finite element procedure to the functionals. Optimal laws of creep deformation are formulated using the criterion of minimizing damage in the functionals of the inverse problems. The formulated problems are reduced to the problems solved by the finite element method using MSC.Marc software. Currently, forming of light metals poses tremendous challenges due to their low ductility at room temperature and their unusual deformation characteristics at hot-cold work: strong asymmetry between tensile and compressive behavior, and a very pronounced anisotropy. We used the constitutive models of steady-state creep of initially transverse isotropy structural materials the kind of the stress state has influence. The paper gives basics of the developed computer-aided system of design, modeling, and electronic simulation targeting the processes of manufacture of wing integral panels. The modeling results can be used to calculate the die tooling, determine the panel processibility, and control panel rejection in the course of forming.
With an increasing number of power plants operated in excess of their original design service life an early recognition of critical material degradation in components will gain importance. Many years of reactor safety research allowed for the identification and development of electromagnetic NDE methods which detect precursors of imminent damage with high sensitivity, at elevated temperatures and in a radiation environment. Regarding low-alloy heat-resistant steel grade WB 36 (1.6368, 15NiCuMoNb5), effects of thermal and thermo-mechanical aging on mechanical-technological properties and several micromagnetic parameters have been thoroughly studied. In particular knowledge regarding the process of copper precipitation and its acceleration under thermo-mechanical load has been enhanced. Whilst the Cu-rich WB 36 steel is an excellent model material to study and understand aging effects related to neutron radiation without the challenge of handling radioactive specimens in a hot cell, actually neutron-irradiated reactor pressure vessel materials were investigated as well. The neutron fluence experienced and the resulting shift of the ductile-brittle transition temperature were determined electromagnetically, and it was shown that weld and base material can be distinguished from the cladded side of the RPV wall. Low-cycle fatigue of the austenitic stainless steel AISI 347 (1.4550, X6CrNiNb18-10) has been characterized with electromagnetic acoustic transducers (EMATs) at temperatures of up to 300 °C. Time-of-flight and amplitude of the transmitted ultrasound signal were evaluated against the number of load cycles applied and observed as an indication of the imminent material failure significantly earlier than monitoring stresses or strains.
A comprehensive investigation of the structural, elastic, and thermodynamic properties for Laves-phases ZrZn{sub 2} and HfZn{sub 2} are conducted using density functional total energy calculations combined with the quasi-harmonic Debye model. The optimized lattice parameters of ZrZn{sub 2} and HfZn{sub 2} compare well with available experimental values. We estimated the mechanical behaviors of both compounds under compression, including mechanical stability, Young's modulus, Poisson's ratio, ductility, and anisotropy. Additionally, the thermodynamic properties as a function of pressure and temperature are analyzed and found to be in good agreement with the corresponding experimental data.
Nanotwinned metals have rare combinations of mechanical strength and ductility. Previous studies have shown that detwinning occurs in plastically deformed nanotwinned metals. Although molecular dynamics simulations have predicted that fine nanotwins can migrate at low stress, there is little in situ evidence to validate such predictions. Also it is unclear if detwinning occurs prior to or succeeding plastic yielding. Here, by using in situ nanoindentation in a transmission electron microscope, we show that a non-elastic detwinning process in nanotwinned Cu occurred at ultra-low indentation stress (0.1 GPa), well before the stress necessary for plastic yielding. Furthermore, the in situ nanoindentation technique allows us to differentiate dislocation-nucleation dominated microscopic yielding preceding macroscopic yielding manifested by dislocation-transmission through twin boundaries. This study thus provides further insights for understanding plasticity in nanotwinned metals at microscopic levels.
Zinc titanate (ZnTiO{sub 3}) thin films grown by atomic layer deposition with ilmenite structure have recently been identified as an excellent solid lubricant, where low interfacial shear and friction are achieved due to intrafilm shear velocity accommodation in sliding contacts. In this Letter, high resolution transmission electron microscopy with electron diffraction revealed that extensive stacking faults are present on ZnTiO{sub 3} textured (104) planes. These growth stacking faults serve as a pathway for dislocations to glide parallel to the sliding direction and hence achieve low interfacial shear/friction. Generalized stacking fault energy plots also known as γ-surfaces were computed for the (104) surface of ZnTiO{sub 3} using energy minimization method with classical effective partial charge potential and verified by using density functional theory first principles calculations for stacking fault energies along certain directions. These two are in qualitative agreement but classical simulations generally overestimate the energies. In addition, the lowest energy path was determined to be along the [451{sup ¯}] direction and the most favorable glide system is (104) 〈451{sup ¯}〉 that is responsible for the experimentally observed sliding-induced ductility.
Nanoglasses (NGs), metallic glasses (MGs) with a nanoscale grain structure, have the potential to considerably increase the ductility of traditional MGs while retaining their outstanding mechanical properties. We investigated the effects of composition on the structural and mechanical properties of CuZr NG films with grain sizes between 3 to 15 nm using molecular dynamics simulations. Results indicate a transition from localized shear banding to homogeneous superplastic flow with decreasing grain size, although the critical average grain size depends on composition: 5 nm for Cu{sub 36}Zr{sub 64} and 3 nm for Cu{sub 64}Zr{sub 36}. The flow stress of the superplastic NG at different compositions follows the trend of the yield stress of the parent MG, i.e., Cu{sub 36}Zr{sub 64} yield/flow stress: 2.54 GPa/1.29 GPa and Cu{sub 64}Zr{sub 36} yield/flow stress: 3.57 GPa /1.58 GPa. Structural analysis indicates that the differences in mechanical behavior as a function of composition are rooted at the distinct statistics of prominent atomic Voronoi polyhedra. The mechanical behavior of NGs is also affected by the grain boundary thickness and the fraction of atoms at interfaces for a given average grain size. The results suggest that the composition dependence of the mechanical behavior of NGs follows that of their parent MGs, e.g., a stronger MG will generate a stronger NG, while the intrinsic tendency for homogeneous deformation occurring at small grain size is not affected by composition.
The structural and elastic properties of RuN{sub 2} were investigated through the first-principles calculation using generalized gradient approximation (GGA) and local density approximation (LDA) within the plane-wave pseudopotential density functional theory. The obtained equilibrium structure and mechanical properties are in excellent agreement with other theoretical results. Then we compared the elastic modulus of RuN{sub 2} with several other isomorphic noble metal nitrides. Results show that RuN{sub 2} can nearly rival with OsN{sub 2} and IrN{sub 2}, which indicate RuN{sub 2} is a potentially ultra-incompressible and hard material. By the elastic stability criteria, it is predicted that RuN{sub 2} is stable in our calculations (0–100 GPa). The calculated B/G ratios indicate that RuN{sub 2} possesses brittle nature at 0 GPa and when the pressure increases to 13.4 GPa (for LDA) or 20.8 GPa (for GGA), it begins to prone to ductility. Through the quasi-harmonic Debye model, we also investigated the thermodynamic properties of RuN{sub 2}.
Comparative studies of the mechanical behavior between copper, tungsten, and W/Cu nanocomposite based on copper dispersoïd thin films were performed under in-situ controlled tensile equi-biaxial loadings using both synchrotron X-ray diffraction and digital image correlation techniques. The films first deform elastically with the lattice strain equal to the true strain given by digital image correlation measurements. The Cu single thin film intrinsic elastic limit of 0.27% is determined below the apparent elastic limit of W and W/Cu nanocomposite thin films, 0.30% and 0.49%, respectively. This difference is found to be driven by the existence of as-deposited residual stresses. Above the elastic limit on the lattice strain-true strain curves, we discriminate two different behaviors presumably footprints of plasticity and fracture. The Cu thin film shows a large transition domain (0.60% true strain range) to a plateau with a smooth evolution of the curve which is associated to peak broadening. In contrast, W and W/Cu nanocomposite thin films show a less smooth and reduced transition domain (0.30% true strain range) to a plateau with no peak broadening. These observations indicate that copper thin film shows some ductility while tungsten/copper nanocomposites thin films are brittle. Fracture resistance of W/Cu nanocomposite thin film is improved thanks to the high compressive residual stress and the elimination of the metastable β-W phase.