Evolution of Precipitate Microstructure During Creep of an AA7449 T7651 Aluminum Alloy

Creep forming is a process where plastic deformation is applied at the material’s aging temperature. It enables to obtain parts of complex shape with reduced internal stresses and finds applications, for instance, in the aerospace industry. In this article, we report in-situ small-angle X-ray scattering measurements during creep experiments carried out on an AA7449 Al-Zn-Mg-Cu alloy in the T7651 temper. In the range of temperatures of 413 K to 453 K (140 °C to 180 °C), we show that the initial microstructure is not stable with respect to the applied stress/strain. Accelerated precipitation coarsening is shown to occur, clearly related to the plastic deformation. This strain-induced microstructure evolution is shown to happen even at temperatures well below the aging temperature that has led to the initial temper.