Principles of deformation in single crystals of two different orientations processed by equal-channel angular pressing

The use of single crystals in equal-channel angular pressing provides an opportunity for critically examining the deformation characteristics without including any artifacts due to the presence of grain boundaries. This paper presents an overview of recent experiments in which crystals of high-purity aluminum and copper were pressed through one pass in ECAP using crystals having two different initial orientations: a 0° orientation where the {1 1 1} slip plane lies parallel to the theoretical shear plane and the 〈1 1 0〉 slip direction lies parallel to the shear direction and a 20° orientation where the crystal is rotated about a horizontal axis by 20° in a clockwise sense. The experimental results show good agreement between these two materials but some variations arise because of the difference in the strain hardening rate for the two materials.