Achieving High Strength and High Ductility in Precipitation-Hardened Alloys

摘要

There is a potential for achieving strain hardening, excellent uniform strain, high strength, and good ductility in precipitation-hardened alloys by using a new and simple two-step procedure, involving processing by SPD and aging to homogenize the microstructure and introduce nanoscale particles. A recent report proposed three different strategies for achieving high strength and high ductility in nanostruc-tured and ultrafine-grained metals, but the present approach is different. Although these results were obtained using an Al-Ag alloy as a representative model system, we anticipate the same approach will be equally effective in other precipitation-hardened engineering alloys. Furthermore, since the aging treatments are well-documented for most commercial alloys, it appears that the present approach may be easily adapted for widespread applications.