Microstructural and Textural Evolutions of OFHC Cu during the CECC Process and Annealing Treatment

Abstract

The bulk Cu billets with ultrafine-grained microstructure were successfully processed from full-annealed coarse grained oxygen-free high conductivity (OFHC) Cu by the cyclic extrusion and closed compression (CECC), subsequently annealed at different temperatures. The evolution of the microstructure and mechanical properties was systematically studied. The results show that the effective strain per CECC process is ε=2.77, with further annealing treatment, a high-efficiency grain refinement is realized. After two cycles of CECC process and annealing at 350 °C for 1 h, the grain size refined to ～3 μm, the tensile strength increased to 280 MPa with a high ductility of 54%. Furthermore, a homogeneous structure and mechanical properties in the bulk copper billets for post-forging could be obtained.