Textural and microstructural developments during fabrication of Zr-2.5Nb pressure tubes

Zr-2.5wt%Nb pressure tubes, as used in the Indian pressurized heavy water reactors (PHWR), are fabricated through a combination of hot extrusion followed by two stages of cold pilgering and annealing. The present study makes an effort to systematically characterize the textural changes during the fabrication stages. The starting single-phase hcp martensitic structure was textured to start with and it also went through strong texture developments during hot extrusion. First and especially the second pilgering modified the texture. Such modifications were related to local discontinuity of the softer second phase, as an apparent continuity restricted lattice rotation in the primary hcp phase. Annealing caused discontinuity or spherodization of the bcc phase, but did not create recrystallization in the hcp matrix. The combination of two pilgering plus annealing operations, though the latter did not cause noticeable texture changes, however, reverted the final texture close to the parent hot-extruded texture.