Comparative hot workability of 7012 and 7075 alloys after different pretreatments

Hot torsion tests, in the range 250–450 °C and 0.05–5.0 s−1, were performed on AlZnMgCu alloys (7012 and 7075), which had been direct chill cast, homogenized and precipitation treated to give fine, well-dispersed precipitates. Additional tests were conducted on material that had been extruded, solution treated or precipitation treated at deformation temperature. The peak flow stress was related to the strain rate by the hyperbolic sine equation; the activation energy for precipitated alloys was close to that of the bulk self-diffusion of pure aluminium. For solution-treated metal, the peak stress was very high at low temperatures due to dynamic precipitation; as a consequence, the activation energy was about 50% higher than that of precipitated alloys. The ductility was almost independent of temperature in the investigated range, but decreased with rising strain rate. The ductility of the extruded alloys was almost double that of the as-cast material, with the exception of the solution-treated material where, at low temperature, the ductility of the extruded alloy was lower. The original grains were elongated with precipitates on the boundaries. The dynamically recovered subgrains exhibited sub-boundaries with a high density of fine precipitates and an interior network of dislocations also tied to precipitates.