Influence of thermomechanical processing on the structure and properties of Cu-Ag alloy in situ composites

1IntroductionTheinsitucomposites based on copper alloys with high strength and high electrical conductivity hasbeen developed for applications such as high field magnets,where the tensile strengths in excess of1GPaand electric conductivity above50%IACS(International Annealed Copper Standard)are required[1-5].TheCu alloys included essentially two types:one is the alloy system of Cu with face-centered-cubic(fcc)ele-ments such as Ag,another is the alloy systemof Cu with body-centered-cubic(b…

Influence of thermomechanical processing on the structure and properties of Cu-Ag alloy in situ composites

The influences of the thermomechanical processing, including the solidification conditions, the cold deformation and the intermediate annealing treatment, on the structure and properties of the Cu-10Ag alloy in situ composite were studied in this paper. The cast structure and the structural changes in the cold deformation and intermediate annealing process were observed. The properties including the ultimate tensile strength (UTS) and the electrical conductivity were determined. A two-stage strain strengthening effect for the Cu-10Ag alloy in situ filamentary composite was observed. The factors influencing the UTS and conductivity were discussed. The solidification conditions in the range of 10-1000 K/s cooling rates and the intermediate heat treatment showed obviously influence on the structure and properties on the Cu-10Ag alloy in situ filamentary composite. The typical properties of the Cu-Ag alloy in situ filamentary composites through thermomechanical processing were reported.