Precipitate Coarsening during Overaging of 2519 Al-Cu Alloy: Application to Superplastic Processing

Overaging experiments have been conducted on a commercial grade 2519 Al-Cu alloy at a variety of temperatures and times, with and without prior induced strain. Hardness testing and scanning electron microscopy techniques were used to characterize evolution of microstructure during overaging. The further development of microstructure during thermomechanical processing by warm rolling was also assessed to determine whether the coarse particles produced by overaging could serve as sites for particle stimulated nucleation PSN of recrystallization. The thermomechanical processing methods have been shown to produce highly superplastic microstructures in Al-Mg and Al-Mg-Li alloys in previous work at NPS. Optical microscopy and tensile tests were conducted allowing a determination of the effect of the processing on the microstructural evolution and superplastic behavior of the Al-Cu material. Aluminum-Copper Alloys, Superplasticity, Thermomechanical Process.