Transformation superplasticity of zirconium

A tensile strain of 270 pct was achieved for coarse-grained zirconium subjected to transformation superplasticity conditions, where strain increments are accumulated upon repeated thermal cycling around the allotropic transformation temperature under the biasing effect of a uniaxial tensile stress. The strain increment per cycle was found to consist of two equal contributions from transformations on heating and cooling and to increase linearly with the applied stress. The measured strain increments are in good quantitative agreement with predictions based on the average internal stress during the transformation, which was determined independently from experimental transformation times. As the cycling frequency is raised, the average strain rate increases (a maximum value of 1.3 · 10^-4s^-1 was measured), but the strain increment per cycle decreases above a critical cycling frequency, for which the sample gage section undergoes only a partial phase transformation. The resulting reduction in internal mismatch and increase in internal stress are modeled using the experimental observation that β-Zr deforms by a mixture of diffusional and dislocation creep in the stress range of interest.