The Effect of Fe Content on Recrystallization Texture Evolution, Microstructures, and Earing of Cold Rolled Continuous Cast AA5052 Alloy Sheets

Continuous cast AA5052 Al alloys, containing iron contents of 0.120 and 0.466 wt pct, respectively, were cold rolled and annealed at temperatures ranging from 505 K to 755 K (232 °C to 482 °C). The recrystallization textures in the two alloys were analyzed using X-ray diffraction and electron back scatter diffraction, respectively. It was found that higher Fe content promoted the formation of deformation textures and retarded the formation of cube texture in the two alloys. Most cube-oriented grains formed in both these alloys were associated with coarse particles, whereas the P—{011}〈566〉, R—{123}〈634〉, and Goss or randomly oriented grains were often related to particle stringers consisted of fine particles along the rolling direction. It was also found that the volume fraction of each texture component was a Johnson–Mehl–Avrami–Kolmogorov-type function of annealing temperature in the two alloys. The texture evolution rate with the annealing temperature was calculated from this function and used to determine the onset temperature of each recrystallization texture component.