Distinct Recrystallization Pathways in a Cold-Rolled Al-2%Mg Alloy Evidenced by In-Situ Neutron Diffraction

The time-of-flight neutron diffraction data collected in-situ on Oak Ridge National Laboratory's (ORNL, Oak Ridge, TN, USA) VULCAN and Los Alamos National Laboratory's (LANL, Los Alamos, NM, USA) High-Pressure-Preferred-Orientation (HIPPO) diffractometers have been analyzed complementarily to show the texture evolution during annealing of a cold-rolled Al-2%Mg alloy. The texture analysis aimed to identify the components present in the initial rolling (or deformation) texture and in the thermally-activated recrystallization texture, respectively. Using a quasi-Monte-Carlo (QMC) approach, a new method has been developed to simulate the weighted texture components, and to obtain inverse pole figures for both rolling and normal directions. As such, distinct recrystallization pathways during annealing in isochronal conditions, can be revealed in terms of the evolution of the texture components and their respective volume fractions. Moreover, the recrystallization kinetics associated with the cube and random texture components are analyzed quantitatively using a similar approach developed for differential scanning calorimetry (DSC).