Studying the recovery of as-received industrial Al alloys by positron annihilation spectroscopy

Positron annihilation lifetime (PAL) spectroscopy, Doppler broadening of annihilation radiation (DBAR) spectroscopy and Vickers microhardness (Hv) measurements were performed to study the micro- and macro-structure variations during isochronal annealing from room temperature (RT) to 500 8C of commercial pure Al (1 1 0 0), Al–Mn–Mg (3 0 0 4) and Al–Mg–Si (6 2 0 1) alloys. Three annealing stages of microstructures have been identified as recovery, partial recrystallization and complete recrystallization followed by grain growth. A positive correlation between the macroscopic mechanical properties (Hv) and positron annihilation parameters has been achieved for the three samples under investigation.