Abstract:This research provides experimental evidence for localized shear, billet cracking, and segmentation during the processing of various copper alloys. The results demonstrate that although many parameters affect the shear localization, there is a direct relation between segmentation and alloy strength (hardness) that is related to the alloying elements and constitutive phases. For instance, alpha brass is successfully processed by ECAP at room temperature, but alpha/beta brasses fail even at a temperature of 350 °C. Finite element simulation of cracking and segmentation was performed using DEFORM^TM to investigate the influence of different parameters on segmentation. The results confirm that friction and processing speed have narrow effects on attaining a perfect billet. However, employing back pressure could be reliably used to diminish shear localization, billet cracking, segmentation, and damage. Moreover, diminishing the flow localization using back pressure leads to uniform material flow and the billet homogeneity increases by 36.1%, when back pressure increases from 0 to 600 MPa.

Key words: back pressure; brass; bronze; damage; flow localization; stress-strain behavior; tensile strength; ductility