Przemysław Snopiński

By Tomasz Tański and Przemysław Snopiński

Aluminum and aluminum alloys are widely used for aircraft structures, where they are subjected to demanding conditions and where is an increased demand for weight reduction and fuel savings. Aluminum comprises 8% of the earth?s crust and is, therefore, the most abundant structural metal. Its production since 1965 has surpassed that of copper and now comes next to iron. This increased use of aluminum alloys leads to a need for deeper understanding of their mechanical properties and the impacts of processing parameters. The mechanical properties can determine by controlling the microstructures of the alloys. For example, precipitation hardening is the main strengthening mechanism improving the tensile and yield strength. Solute atoms, precipitates and dispersoids influences to the yield strength, since they act as distributed pinning points for mobile dislocations, thus increasing the shear stress required to move the dislocations. Another approach is the manipulation of a grain size that can be performed by alloying or plastic deformation processes. Therefore, the precise understanding of each mechanism that can influence the properties of aluminum and its alloys is very important. The aim of this chapter is to shed light on the influence of the processing history on the microstructure and mechanical properties.

Part of the book: Aluminium Alloys