Strength-ductility balance of AZ31 magnesium alloy via accumulated extrusion bonding combined with two-stage artificial cooling

AZ31 Mg alloy with heterogeneous bimodal grain structure (smaller grain size of 5–20 µm and coarser grain size of 100–200 µm) was subjected to accumulated extrusion bonding (AEB) at 250 ℃ combined with two-stage artificial cooling in this work, viz. local water cooling and artificial cooling. The microstructure developed consecutively as a result of discontinuous dynamic recrystallization (DDRX) for the AEBed samples. {10–12} tensile twinning also played an important role for the AEB with local water cooling at the initial extrusion stage in the container. Local water cooling could further reduce the DRXed grain size to ∼2.1 µm comparing that without water cooling. And the grain growth rate was reduced by artificial cooling out of extrusion die. Under the combination of two-stage cooling, the fine DRXed grains at sizing band were almost retained with average grain size of ∼2.3 µm after the sheet out of extrusion die, and the unDRXed grains with high residual dislocation density accumulation were also reserved. The tensile tests results indicated that a good strength-ductility balance with a high ultimate tensile strength (319 MPa vs. 412 MPa) and fracture elongation (19.9% vs. 30.3%) were obtained. The strength enhancement was mainly owing to the grain refinement and local residual plastic strain reserved by the artificial cooling. The excellent ductility originated from fine DRXed microstructure and ED-tilt double peak texture.