Study on Microstructure Evolution and Constitutive Model Establishment of Semi-solid WE43 Magnesium Alloy during Hot Deformation Process
摘要
To investigate the thermal deformation behavior and microstructure evolution of semi-solid WE43 magnesium alloy, thermal compression experiments were carried out in this paper under different strain rates, temperatures and strain conditions. The microstructure and grain orientation were analyzed using Optical Microscopy (OM), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM), and Electron Backscatter Diffraction (EBSD) techniques. The results show that as the temperature increases, the strain rate decreases, and the strain increases, the liquid-phase content of the semi-solid WE43 magnesium alloy increases, the roundness of the solid-phase grains increases, and the morphology is mainly spherical and nearly spherical. These factors influence its thixotropic deformation mechanism. Under high temperature, high strain, and low strain rate conditions, the thixotropic deformation mechanism is mainly dominated by liquid-phase flow, supplemented by solid-phase grain plastic deformation; Under low temperatures, low strains and high strain rates, solid-phase grain plastic deformation dominates, supplemented by liquid-phase flow. In addition, based on the experimental data, the stress-strain curves at low temperatures (300 °C ~ 450 °C) and semi-solid temperatures (550 °C ~ 580 °C) were obtained and the constitutive models at low temperatures and at semi-solid temperatures with the addition of liquid-phase modification factors were established. By comparing the results from the model with the data obtained from experiments, the average relative errors at low and semi-solid temperatures are 2.21% and 9.17%, respectively. This demonstrates good agreement between the developed model and experimental results. The findings provide valuable guidance for formulating the hot deformation process of WE43 magnesium alloy.