Effect of neutron dose and irradiation temperature on the mechanical properties and structure of dispersion strengthened copper alloys

This report is the first to present the data on the effect of neutron irradiation doses of 0.2 and 0.4 dpa at Tirr ∼ 150°C and Tirr ∼ 300°C on the mechanical properties of the GlidCopAl25IG alloy in different metallurgical conditions (CR+annealed, HIP, as-extruded). The dose dependence of radiation strengthening for GlidCopAl25IG alloy at Ttest=Tirr=150°C shows that strengthening increases with dose, up to Δσy ∼ 100 MPa at 0.4 dpa. Simultaneously, the uniform elongation decreases with increasing dose. An important point is that all investigations on ODS copper alloys, regardless of the metallurgical state (CR+ann, HIP, as-extruded), revealed similar dose dependencies of strengthening and loss of ductility. Irradiation up to 0.4 dpa at 300°C results in a slight strengthening of about 30 MPa of the ODS copper alloys. In this case the tendency to embrittlement depends on the metallurgical state and orientation of the specimens.