Low-temperature elastic properties of four wrought and annealed aluminium alloys

The elastic properties of four annealed polycrystalline commercial aluminium alloys were studied between 4 and 300 K using a pulse-superposition method. Results are given for longitudinal sound velocity, transverse sound velocity, Young's modulus, shear modulus, bulk modulus (reciprocal compressibility), Poisson's ratio, and elastic Debye temperature. The elastic stiffnesses of the alloys increase 4 to 13% on cooling from room temperature to liquid helium temperature. The elastic constant-temperature curves exhibit regular behaviour.