The effect of forging passes on the refinement of high purity aluminum during multi-forging was investigated. The attention was focused on the structure uniformity due to deformation uniformity and the grain refinement limitation with very high strains. The results show that the fine grain zone in the center of sample expands gradually with the increase of forging passes. When the forging passes reach 6, an X-shape fine grain zone is initially formed. With a further increase of the passes, this X-shape zone tends to spread the whole sample. Limitation in the structural refinement is observed with increasing strains during multi-forging process at the room temperature. The grains size in the center is refined to a certain size （110 μm as forging passes reach 12, and there is no further grain refinement in the center with increasing the forging passes to 24. However, the size of the coarse grains near the surface is continuously decreased with increasing the forging passes to 24.
5182 Al alloy ingots with the diameters of 100 mm are produced by conventional and combined electromagnetic fields （CEMF） horizontal direction chill （HDC） cast- ing process. The effect of CEMF on the ingot surface quality and floating grains is investigated. The results show that the CEMF is effective in reducing the segregation layer in both top and bottom sub-surfaces. Big floating grains with coarse dendrite arms mainly distribute in the crescent-shaped area near the bottom in the conven- tional HDC casting ingot. With the application of the CEMF, they disappear in the whole cross section of the HDC casting ingot and the equiaxed grains are significantly refined.
Qingfeng ZHU Zhihao ZHAO Yubo ZUO Xiangjie WANG Jianzhong CUI
