Grain coarsening and texture evolution of pre-stretched 2219 aluminum alloy sheets during subsequent solution treatment

During the two-pass stretch forming process for manufacturing of thin-walled aluminum alloy sheet components, abnormal grain growth may happen if an improper pre-deformation degree was conducted before solution heat treatment, which is negative to the performance and surface quality of the final components. In order to overcome this problem, the effect of pre-stretching deformation was investigated on the change of grain structures of 2219 aluminum alloy sheets. The 2219 aluminum alloy sheets were pre-stretched with various deformation degrees, and then were heated to 540 °C for about 50 min for solution treatment. The grain structures before and after solution treatment were characterized using an optical microscope (OM) and electron back scattering diffraction (EBSD). Results show that the grains grew up gradually during the solution treatment with an increase of pre-stretching. The critical pre-stretching degree is about 3%. Once the pre-deformation exceeds 3%, the grain growth is significant, especially when it reaches 5%. Moreover, the pre-stretching has little influence on the orientation distribution. Some near a copper texture {112}<111> were generated as the pre-stretching degree was increased to 5%. All the results suggest that the pre-stretching before solution treatment cannot be larger than 3% in the two-pass stretch forming of a 2219 aluminum sheet.